- The situation is serious. The spread of infection is too great. And we must take steps to limit this development, says the Prime Minister to NTB.
- Are you looking for professional accounting services?
- Phone: +0047 93982173 XNUMX
- Service in Polish
- Discounts for new customers
- Topnor www.topnor.no
During the pandemic, hospital admissions are higher than ever, with 358 hospitalized on Monday. At the same time, the infection continues to grow, with just over 32 new cases registered last week. In its new risk assessment, the National Institute of Public Health (FHI) predicts that the omicron variant will lead to "significantly increased spread of infection" in the future.
Støre says now the goal will be to control infection throughout the winter.
- It has two goals, he says.
– One of them is to avoid overload health service, which affects the work they have to do, both in hospitals and in municipalities. The second is to ensure that social and economic burdens do not become greater than necessary.
Omikron "changes the rules of the game"
It is the omicron that challenges us, says the prime minister.
So far, 958 cases of a new virus variant have been detected in Norway. Omikron is believed to be more contagious than previous variants, and vaccines appear to provide less protection against infection.
At the same time, there is hope that the variant may be milder than delta. But it is still uncertain.
- Omikron changes the rules of the game. Today we don't have enough knowledge about mutations, says Støre.
He emphasizes that the health care system must be protected from stress. At the same time, the problem is high sickness absence.
- This requires constant adaptation of our resources. And we have to do that now around the Christmas season as well.
- Already this week?
- Yes, with the development that we are now observing, new measures will appear.
- What kind of adjustments are coming?
- We'll get back to that soon. We work with this every day and receive regular updates, and the FHI and the Norwegian Health Directorate are filling the knowledge gaps. But now we especially use the National Institute of Public Health's analysis of the spread and increase of the infection rate as a basis for our measurements.
Infection control and vaccination
The prime minister has announced that the new measures will go in two directions.
One of them is to mitigate the spread of infection by reducing the number of social contacts.
- There is every reason to believe that the measures taken have an effect on the infection. But in the current situation, we don't have time to wait for the effects of the measures taken, says Støre.
The second is vaccination.
- We are on on the right track. But we are looking for opportunities to do it even better.
Støre does not describe in more detail how this could happen, but one of the questions that health authorities have recently considered is the vaccination of children between the ages of five and eleven.
Another issue is the introduction of the third adult dose.
Christmas holidays
The announcement of the new measures comes less than a week after the government's previous package of recommendations.
But we just have to get used to such changes, says Støre. It underlines that it made reservations with caution when presenting the previous package of measures.
- I also said then that we might have to come back soon with new recommendations. And if we learn about it, we will not hesitate.
Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre confirms it is necessary to tighten measures on the coronavirus again.
- Will it be possible to celebrate Christmas this year?
- Yes.
- Are we going to close?
- We must prepare for actions that unfortunately interfere with people's everyday lives.
Source: NTB
Photo: Torstein Bøe / POOL / NTB
Read our next article: Oslo council chairman sick ...
