Austria will become the first country in western Europe to reimpose a full COVID-19 lockdown, it said on Friday as neighboring Germany warned it may follow suit, sending shivers through financial markets worried about the economic fallout.
Europe has again become the epicenter of the pandemic, accounting for half of global cases and deaths. A fourth wave of infections has plunged Germany, Europe’s largest economy, into a national emergency, Health Minister Jens Spahn said, warning that vaccinations alone will not cut case numbers.
Austria said it in addition to lockdown it would require the whole population to be vaccinated from Feb. 1. Both decisions infuriated many in a country where skepticism about state mandates affecting individual freedoms runs high, encouraged by the far-right Freedom Party, the third biggest in parliament.
Party leader Herbert Kickl posted a picture on Facebook with the inscription: “As of today Austria is a dictatorship.” The party is planning a protest on Saturday, but Kickl cannot attend because he has tested positive for COVID-19.
Roughly two-thirds of those eligible in Austria are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, one of the lowest rates in western Europe. Its infections are among the highest in Europe, with a seven-day incidence of 991 per 100,000 people.
“We have not succeeded in convincing enough people to get vaccinated,” Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg told a news conference, saying the lockdown would start on Monday and the requirement to be vaccinated on Feb. 1.
“It hurts that such measures still have to be taken.”
Asked if Germany could rule out an Austrian-style full lockdown, Spahn said: “We are now in a situation – even if this produces a news alert – where we can’t rule anything out.
“We are in a national emergency,” he told a news conference.
The threat of fresh lockdowns comes as optimism grows about experimental drugs developed by Pfizer and Merck that cut the chance of hospitalization and severe illness, more weapons in the world’s fight against the virus.
On Friday, the EU drug regulator said it was reviewing data on Pfizer’s COVID-19 pill to help member states decide on quick adoption ahead of any formal EU-wide approval.
Looming lockdowns weighed on a range of financial market sectors on Friday, pushing stocks and oil down and boosting the dollar.
“We expect targeted measures [against COVID-19] across some countries mainly according to the health situation, but other factors, such as domestic political situations, will be relevant,” Oxford Economics analysts said in a note.
“And while it might take a while before a political consensus can be reached in other countries, it is clear that the tide has turned.”
(Additional reporting by Dhara Ranasinghe, Josephine Mason and Mark John in London, Zuzanna Szymanska in Berlin; Writing by Paul Carrel and Nick Macfie; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
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