The prescribed isolation for corona infected people is to be reduced to five days.

This was announced by the Ministry of Health in Saxony-Anhalt on Thursday evening.

In a video link by the heads of federal and state departments, the Federal Ministry of Health announced that the recommendation of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) with regard to the duration of isolation and quarantine should be adjusted at the beginning of next week.

“Essentially, it is about reducing the isolation period to five days for those who have been proven to be positive.” Saxony-Anhalt currently chairs the Conference of Health Ministers (GMK).

The countries want to revise their isolation and quarantine regulations accordingly.

The health ministers justify the step with increasing immunity in the population and milder disease progression with the omicron variant.

It is gratifying that "all states have agreed on a uniform approach based on the scientific expertise of the RKI," explained Saxony-Anhalt's Health Minister Petra Grimm-Benne (SPD).

A quarantine for contact persons of infected people should only be urgently recommended, as it was said on Thursday evening after the deliberations of the department heads.

The states are doing it

Several countries are already making headway in reducing the isolation period.

In Baden-Württemberg, too, it should only last five days, as the German Press Agency learned from coalition circles.

From the beginning of May, a final free test after five days will also be omitted for most people if they have had no symptoms for two days.

There are exceptions for staff in clinics or nursing homes.

Baden-Württemberg follows the example of Bavaria, where such a regulation has been in effect since mid-April.

Rhineland-Palatinate and Thuringia had also announced that they would go this route.

So far, isolation and quarantine have usually lasted ten days and can be ended prematurely with a negative test after seven days at the earliest.

Federal Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) had withdrawn an initially planned end to the obligation to isolate.