Thread by @DrEricDing

Explosion of new #COVID19 cases across Eastern Europe & UK. Surge so high that Latvia is forced into lockdown, and Latvia health minister blames “disinformation” about vaccines in Russian-language media for vaccine skepticism. New wave possibly restarting.
theguardian.com/world/2021/oct…

2) Last week, Latvian president tested positive, forcing Finland’s president, who had met Levits a day earlier, to self-isolate. Latvia was for a long time viewed as one of Europe’s few COVID success stories—fewer than 3,000 Covid deaths since the start of the pandemic.

3) Latvia health minister Pavluts said there was "disinformation" about vaccines in Russian-language media.
"To address the disinformation in Russian, we are doubling our efforts on the information campaign, everything will also be translated in Russian,"
barrons.com/news/latvia-pl…

4) The World Health Organization said there was a 7% rise in new coronavirus cases across Europe last week, the only region in the world where cases increased, according to the health body. arklatexhomepage.com/news/business/…

5) Poland’s health minister said on Wednesday the country had experienced an “explosion of the pandemic in the last two days” and warned the Covid situation was “becoming very serious”. Poland’s daily number of cases had exceeded 5,000 for the first time since May.

6) Bulgaria on Tuesday recorded its highest Covid death rate since late March, and the authorities made vaccine passports compulsory for visiting gyms, museums, cafes and other public places to stop the spread of the virus.


7) In Romania and Ukraine local hospitals have found themselves under intense pressure, as the two countries have been posting record numbers of Covid deaths this month.

8) In Russia, which has been reporting record daily deaths and has a vaccination rate dramatically below the EU’s, with only a third of its population vaccinated, a new set of restrictions was announced on Tuesday.

9) In Moscow, unvaccinated citizens aged over 60 were ordered to stay at home for four months and vaccine passports were introduced in several regions.
Moscow will go into a full lockdown if coronavirus infections continue to increase in the capital