Current Corona situation City of Bonn to expand testing strategy, schools still open
Bonn · Still, a lot of questions remain around the latest set of rules that was published yesterday. Here are some answers.
All employees of the City of Bonn as well as committee and council members will be able to be tested regularly in the future. This is planned by the city administration, as it announced on Tuesday. The background to this is the federal-state talks held on Monday and the urgent appeal made there to employers to ensure that employees have the opportunity to take comprehensive tests. "In this context, the Federal City of Bonn must also fulfil its obligation to society as a whole to make a comprehensive contribution to containing the pandemic," the city announced. So far, the city of Bonn has provided testing opportunities for "particularly stressed occupational groups of the city administration" such as the public order service or social workers.
The City of Bonn also makes it clear that the emergency brake that the state government will pull will also apply to the shops, museums and sports facilities in Bonn. This will be the case as of Monday.
With regard to the "rest days" around Easter announced by the federal government and the state, the city expects explanations from the state of NRW shortly as to what exactly this will look like.
Will travel change?
The federal and state governments "urgently" appeal to citizens to refrain from non-essential travel at home and abroad. There is already a quarantine obligation for returnees from foreign areas with high infection rates or with a strong spread of virus variants. The federal government also wants to make a test before departure mandatory for entry into Germany. For this to happen, however, the Bundestag would have to approve an amendment to the Infection Protection Act. NRW Transport Minister Hendrik Wüst (CDU) is preparing "modalities for testing after landing" with the managing directors of the major NRW airports, Laschet announced. "And we will also carry out these tests."
Is it still possible to shop shortly before the Easter holidays?
Yes, according to the federal-state decision, but only on Holy Saturday (3 April) in "food retailing in the narrow sense". What exactly this includes has not yet been defined. Otherwise, there is a general ban on gatherings in public spaces from 1 April (Maundy Thursday) to 5 April (Easter Monday). Whether this also applies to demonstrations has not yet been answered. Nor whether this will then act as a public holiday for all companies and employees. The heads of the state chancelleries are still to clarify open legal questions. Religious communities are asked to hold only virtual services during this time. Vaccination and testing centres will remain open. In principle, the "#WeStayAtHome" rule applies around Easter, according to the resolution of the federal and state governments.
Will daycare centres and schools be closed?
Daycare centres and schools in NRW will remain open until the Easter holidays at the end of March, the Minister President assured. However, the CDU/FDP state government had allowed individual municipalities with particularly high infection rates to restrict attendance classes at secondary schools until Easter and to send several grades back to distance learning.
(Original text: GA / Translation: Mareike Graepel)
