German health officials reported the highest number of deaths from the coronavirus pandemic on Wednesday.
The Associated Press reported that officials at the German Robert Koch Institute, which functions as the country’s highest health authority, recorded 962 deaths in a 24-hour period on Wednesday morning, an increase that comes with the highest number of new cases of COVID-19 in Germany in the pandemic so far.
Just under 28,000 people have died across Germany from the disease, a number that remains much lower than the US and other countries that have had less success in limiting the spread of the virus. But the daily rate of deaths in Germany from the virus has risen by 62% in the past two weeks, highlighting concerns in the country.
The new figures come as the German health minister said on Monday that the country’s health authorities will begin vaccinations for COVID-19 on December 27 in care homes for the elderly in Germany, a few weeks after the vaccine began to be distributed in the sea. Britain and the USA.
Chancellor Angela Merkel announced earlier this month that personal learning in German schools will be canceled at least until Christmas and closed many non-essential companies, while putting limits on meetings before the Christmas holidays.
“The measures we started on November 2 were not enough,” Merkel said in a statement last weekend.
“The health system is under great stress and our aim has always been to avoid overburdening the health system,” the chancellor added at the time.