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What will happen to Christmas?

No question seemed more urgent when the federal and state governments announced the Corona timetable for December on Wednesday.

A planned relaxation almost went under: From December, contact persons of infected people will only have to be in quarantine for ten days instead of the previous 14 days - provided those affected can then submit a negative rapid test.

A first-degree contact person is, for example, someone who has been in closer contact for more than 15 minutes with a distance of less than one and a half meters from those who tested positive.

The recommendations of the federally owned Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for the health authorities should be adapted accordingly.

Not even in place yet, the next step could soon follow.

The SPD health expert Karl Lauterbach considers a further shortening to seven days possible.

"I think that with such a regulation we could increase the willingness to actually implement the quarantine and would not lose anything essential in terms of security," Lauterbach told WELT.

The long quarantine beyond the margin necessary for security does not help at a time when the willingness of the population to cooperate is declining.

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The model is based on an idea from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the US counterpart to the Robert Koch Institute.

The agency is considering shortening the quarantine period to seven days, as the Wall Street Journal reports.

The authority recommends a negative test result for early cancellation.

The experts hardly see any major infection risks in this.

If a test is negative after seven days, the likelihood that an infection will develop afterwards is very low, CDC doctor Henry Walke told the paper.

The CDC hope that this will result in greater public acceptance of the quarantine.

Economy welcomes shortening of quarantine

Federal Minister of Health Jens Spahn (CDU) also sees no additional infection risks in the shortening in this country.

"Ten days of quarantine with a quick test at the end is just as safe as 14 days of quarantine without a test, but it means four days fewer restrictions for those affected," he told the newspapers of the Funke media group.

It is worth shortening the quarantine.

But there is a catch: whether more rapid antigen tests will be used in the population as a result of the shortening remained unclear at first.

In the USA, the tests will soon be approved for personal use, but in Germany, a doctor or medical specialist will still have to take the smear.

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Large parts of the German economy are satisfied with the shortening: It is an important relief for the workforce of companies, according to the Central Association of German Crafts (ZDH).

The lower quarantine time reduces this burden because the pandemic-related downtimes of employees are noticeably reduced.

"The test-based shortening of the quarantine makes sense," says BDI President Dieter Kempf.

This relieves the affected citizens, but also the economy.

For the industry, however, the measure is likely to be the notorious drop in the ocean.

"The most serious dangers to economic recovery in the coming year lie in large-scale company closures," says Kempf.

The latest decision offers short-term orientation, but does not yet provide sufficient planning horizon for the economy.