Madrid (AFP)

Europe, Spain in the lead, continues its gradual return to a "normal life", and leaves doubt on its strategy in terms of vaccines after having announced not to renew its orders of AstraZeneca.

The European Union has not yet renewed its Covid-19 vaccine supply contract with AstraZeneca for after the month of June, European Commissioner Thierry Breton said on Sunday.

However, this European official left the doubt as to whether this decision meant an end of final inadmissibility for the AstraZeneca vaccine.

“It's not done yet, wait,” he said.

"We have started" contract renewals with Pfizer / BioNTech but "we will have more", he added.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Saturday announced a new contract to purchase up to 1.8 billion doses of Covid vaccine from BioNTech-Pfizer.

"Other contracts and other vaccine technologies will follow," she added.

The contract with the German and American laboratories, allies in the production of anti-Covid vaccines, provide for deliveries from this year until 2023.

AstraZeneca's vaccine "will help us get out of the crisis", he noted, from Strasbourg where he kicked off the Conference on the Future of Europe.

"But to respond to the variants, we see that other vaccines are now more effective," he continued, stressing the "pragmatism" that the EU had always shown on the issue of vaccines.

The European Medicines Agency is traveling to Russia on Monday to inspect the production sites of the Sputnik V vaccine, still not authorized in the EU, even though Hungary has started using it.

- Wind of freedom -

As vaccination campaigns intensified, several European countries began this weekend to lift some of the restrictions imposed for months in the hope of containing the contaminations.

A wind of freedom thus arose on Sunday with the end of the state of health emergency in Spain, where the inhabitants were finally able to leave their region or gather in the street in the evening.

In several cities of the country, shouts, applause and music marked, at midnight the end of this exceptional regime imposed since October and the lifting in most regions of the curfew.

"It looks like New Year's Eve," said Oriol Corbella, 28, out in the streets of Barcelona (north-east) like hundreds of young people.

"We find a little normality, freedom, but we must keep in mind that the virus is still present," he added.

In Britain, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will confirm on Monday the easing of restrictions linked to the pandemic caused by the coronavirus, based on the improvement in the health situation, his services announced on Sunday.

In Germany, the more than 7 million people vaccinated in Germany are now benefiting from the relaxation of strict health rules.

This easing will allow them to meet in groups or to enter any store without having to present a negative test, as is currently the case for the rest of the population, with the exception of so-called shops " essentials "such as supermarkets or pharmacies.

- La Scala open to the public -

And in some towns in Bavaria, in southern Germany, the terraces of bars and restaurants reopen on Monday.

In Milan, in northern Italy, the famous La Scala theater reopens its doors to the public on Monday.

And the Mediterranean island of Cyprus reopens its borders on Monday to vaccinated tourists from 65 countries.

Elsewhere in the world, the situation remained tense in India.

For the first time on Saturday, this country of 1.3 billion inhabitants recorded the death of more than 4,000 people due to Covid-19 in 24 hours and more than 400,000 new infections.

But experts believe the official figures are grossly underestimated.

The variant of the coronavirus discovered in this country is more contagious and has characteristics that could make vaccines less effective, contributing to the acceleration of the epidemic in India, for his part warned on Saturday the chief scientist of the World Organization. of Health (WHO) Soumya Swaminathan.

For the moment, it is very difficult to fight against the virus "because the epidemic affects thousands of people and it is multiplying at a rate that is very difficult to stop", said Ms. Swaminathan, warning that the vaccination alone would not be sufficient to regain control of the situation.

India, which is the world's largest producer of vaccines, has so far administered two doses to only 2% of its population.

In the United States, the Covid-19, which has officially killed 581,751 since the start of 2020, has "no doubt" killed many more people in the country most bereaved in the world by the pandemic, estimated Sunday the medical adviser of the White House Anthony Fauci.

And in Tunisia, a new week-long lockdown, encompassing the Muslim holiday celebrating the end of Ramadan, began on Sunday, as hospitals struggle to deal with the increase in coronavirus cases.

Tunisian authorities warned on Friday that the health system threatened to "collapse" due to the growing influx of patients into hospitals.

burx / ob / cn

© 2021 AFP