Chancellor Angela Merkel says Germany will have to apply an “emergency brake” to reverse some recent relaxations of pandemic restrictions as coronavirus infections accelerate.
Germany’s national disease control centre says new infections are growing exponentially as the more contagious Covid-19 variant first detected in Britain has become dominant in the country.
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Under an agreement with state governors two weeks ago, Ms Merkel is supposed to reimpose restrictions in regions where the number of new weekly cases rises above 100 per 100,000 inhabitants.
The nationwide average stood at 95.6 on Friday.
Ms Merkel said that “unfortunately, we will have to make use of this emergency brake”.
