Paris (AFP)

Germany, Hungary and Slovakia began to vaccinate their populations against the coronavirus on Saturday, on the eve of the launch of vaccination campaigns in most other EU member states, which gave the green light on December 21 to the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine.

The first dose administered on German territory was to Edith Kwoizalla, a 101-year-old resident of a retirement home in the Sachsen-Anhalt (east) region.

In Hungary, Arienne Kertesz, a female doctor at the South Pest hospital in the capital Budapest, led the way.

"I have been waiting a long time to have it, because my ability to work calmly and safely depends on it," she said.

And it is an infectious disease specialist, Vladimir Krcmery, who was the first to be vaccinated in Slovakia, in Nitra (west).

- Arrival of the first doses in the EU -

The first doses of the vaccine arrived in the EU on Saturday on the eve of the start in most of its member states of vaccination campaigns against the coronavirus, the British variant of which is increasingly reported around the world

Russia, which surpassed three million cases on Saturday, the United Kingdom, the United States, Mexico and many other countries have already started to vaccinate their populations in early December.

China was the first to do so last summer.

The United States remains the most affected by Covid-19, both in terms of the number of deaths (330,279) and cases (18,761,363).

The current president has in fact rejected it, asking among other things for an increase in direct aid to households.

Several countries announced on Saturday confirmed cases of the British variant of the coronavirus, such as Italy, Sweden, Spain and Japan, after the announcement this week of contaminations in France, Germany, Lebanon and Denmark.

According to a study from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), this new variant is "50% to 74%" more contagious than its predecessors, raising fears of more hospitalizations and deaths in 2021 than in 2020.

After its discovery, the concern had pushed dozens of States to cut their air, sea or land links with the United Kingdom, sowing chaos in its supply and mayhem on the outskirts of Dover (south-west) where thousands trucks were stuck for several days.

But the situation in this strategic port was now "resolved" and traffic to Calais, in the north of France, weakened "sharply", after the passage of 2,200 heavy goods vehicles on Friday and 1,500 on Saturday.

Japan decided on Saturday to put an end to all new arrivals of non-resident foreigners on its territory from Monday until the end of January.

A new daily record of new Covid-19 cases, one thousand, has been recorded in Tokyo.

- Switzerland too optimistic -

In Italy, the most bereaved European country (more than 71,000 dead), 9,750 doses of vaccine escorted by the riflemen were delivered to the Spallanzani hospital in Rome on Saturday morning.

Faced with a surge in the number of cases, Italy had already reconfigured even before Christmas, like Ireland, which received its vaccines on Saturday but will not start its campaign until Wednesday.

Switzerland, for its part, made amends, acknowledging that the government had been overly optimistic after the first wave of the epidemic by relaxing restrictions, resulting in one of the highest contamination rates in Europe during the second wave.

At the end of the first wave last summer, "we had the feeling that the worst was over, it was one of the most serious mistakes," said Alain Berset, the Swiss Minister of Health.

In France, 19,500 doses have arrived at the central pharmacy of the Hospitals of Paris, in the Paris suburbs.

Masked workers wearing special cold-protective gloves (the vaccine is stored at -70 ° C) transferred the boxes to special refrigerators.

- "Day full of hope" -

In Germany, the Minister of Health Jens Spahn greeted "a day full of hope", because this vaccine "is the key which will allow us to reclaim our lives".

"Autumn, winter and Christmas next year should no longer be placed under the sign of this pandemic", he hoped.

Like Italy, Austria confined its population on Saturday, Boxing Day.

Non-essential businesses, hotels and restaurants will be closed and the population subject to a curfew all day until January 24.

In the United Kingdom, which passed 70,000 dead on Friday, local lockdowns or severe restrictions have come into force for millions of people.

Mainland Scotland goes on maximum alert, returning to virtual containment, like Northern Ireland.

In England, six million people in the south and east are also returning to containment, which now affects 24 million people in total.

In China, where the WHO first reported the novel coronavirus a year ago, the Communist Party praised its "decisive role (...) which has resulted in an extremely extraordinary glorious victory in this year. extremely unusual ".

This self-congratulation precedes a few days the arrival on Chinese territory of a WHO team to investigate the origins of the virus.

Asia (nearly 215,000 deaths and 13.7 million cases) remains far from European or American records, but several countries are experiencing a resurgence of contagion.

The pandemic has killed at least 1,750,780 and infected almost 80 million people, according to the latest official data compiled by AFP on Saturday.

burx-fio / bds

© 2020 AFP