The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) reports an increase in new infections of 38 percent in a weekly comparison.

According to the weekly management report, these are an increase of almost 155,000 other cases for the past 25th calendar week.

“This increase in seven-day incidence affects all age groups.

In particular, older people and children and young people have seen significant increases compared to the previous week.”

The dominant variant in Germany is still omicron with over 99 percent.

The proportion of sub-line BA.5 was just under 66 percent last week.

According to the RKI, it is striking that the number of acute respiratory diseases has increased significantly compared to the previous year.

There are also more severe courses of Covid 19 diseases again.

However, these are solely due to “the sharp increase in the number of cases of infection”, which is why it is assumed that there is a high overall health risk for the German population and that further advice is given to avoid infections.

WHO expects summer wave in Europe

According to the situation in Germany, the World Health Organization (WHO) expects a new corona wave in Europe this summer.

The coronavirus is expected to spread rapidly over the summer as countries across the region lifted their previous protective measures, WHO Regional Director for Europe Hans Kluge told AFP.

"The virus will not go away just because countries stop monitoring it."

According to the WHO, the number of cases of infection on the European continent has more than tripled within a few weeks due to the spread of the highly contagious omicron subvariant BA.5.

While 150,000 cases of infection per day were registered in the 53 countries that belong to the Europe region of the WHO at the end of May, the number of daily infections is now approaching the 500,000 mark.

The highest infection rates were reported from Austria, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Luxembourg and Portugal.

While the number of deaths in winter was still 4,000 to 5,000 per day, only around 500 deaths per day are currently reported in Europe.

This roughly corresponds to the level of last summer.

Kluge also said he hopes that the vaccinations and numerous infections will mean that the consequences of contagion will usually be less severe than they were at the beginning of the pandemic.

But there are still deaths and serious illnesses to be lamented.

"That's why we stick to our recommendations" for protection against the virus.

People should continue to isolate themselves if they have respiratory symptoms, keep their vaccinations up to date and wear face masks in crowded places.

It is also important to continue tracking the virus, otherwise new transmission patterns and mutations would go undetected for too long, said Kluge.

He also called on countries to continue increasing their vaccination rates.

High immunity plays an important role in preventing further deaths.

Statutory health insurance physicians stink against Lauterbach

The panel doctors are meanwhile going on the barricades because of the new regulations for corona citizen tests.

In a letter to Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach (SPD), the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians and the state associations announced on Thursday that they “will no longer be able to bill and pay out citizen tests in the future”.

The editorial network Germany (RND) first reported on the letter.

It is available from the German Press Agency.

Since Thursday, free tests have only been available for risk groups and other exceptional cases.

For tests, for example for family celebrations, concerts or meetings with people over 60, an additional payment of three euros is due.

Anyone who wants such a test must sign that it is being done for this purpose.

The Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians criticized the fact that they only had four hours and 15 minutes to comment on the new regulations before the new test regulation was published.

There were no reactions from the ministry.

When asked on Thursday evening, the Federal Ministry of Health stated that it was assumed that the associations of statutory health insurance physicians, as public bodies, would continue to fulfill their mandate for billing and random testing of the test centers.