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Munich (dpa) - A group of renowned scientists from medicine to economics is calling for a Europe-wide coordinated action plan to quickly contain the coronavirus and its variants.

The concept under the umbrella term “No Covid” primarily provides for better monitoring of the infection process coordinated by European countries, not additional bans.

The 13 scientists involved reject the “Zero Covid” initiative of a far-reaching and long lockdown because of the grave economic consequences.

“That just doesn't make sense,” said Clemens Fuest, President of the Munich Ifo Institute.

The rapid reduction in the number of cases is intended to enable a rapid return to normality.

"We want our freedom back," said the virologist Melanie Brinkmann from the Helmholtz Center for Infection Research.

The doctor announced a detailed “No Covid” paper with specific proposals for Germany.

One component are regionally different restrictions depending on the infection process.

Where the situation is under control, citizens in “green zones” should again have more freedom.

A key point of the action plan presented on Thursday is the Europe-wide restriction of travel to what is necessary, including quarantine and double compulsory corona tests before departure and after return.

Brinkmann named an incidence value of 10 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants as a “good number”.

On Thursday, according to the Robert Koch Institute, this was 98 in Germany, the current goal of the federal government is an incidence of 50.

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Physicist Viola Priesemann emphasized that a quick reduction in the number of infections is possible.

According to the RKI, Germany had a reproduction factor of 0.87 on Wednesday evening - that's 87 new infections per 100 people infected.

If it were possible to lower the R-value to 0.7, the number of cases would halve every week, explained the scientist, who conducts research at the Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization.

In addition, the scientists advocate consistent Europe-wide measures that are already in place internationally in different forms: the reduction of contacts to small “social bubbles”, home offices and online schools, free corona tests at schools and workplaces, more and faster vaccinations, tests for already vaccinated citizens.

© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210128-99-209429 / 2

The action plan (English, first publication in the medical journal "Lancet"