Friday news summary

Babiš calls for further extension of the emergency state

According to Prime Minister Andrej Babiš (ANO), failure to extend the state of emergency would mean a total collapse of the health care system, an uncontrolled spread of the epidemic and a huge increase in deaths. The Prime Minister said this before his departure to Hungary, where he will discuss the Covid-19 vaccine. The state of emergency has been in place since the 5th of October, until the 14th of February. The government should discuss a request for a further extension on Monday. The Chamber of Deputies would consider it on Thursday afternoon.

According to the Ministry of Health, there were 8,032 new cases in the Czech Republic on Thursday, roughly the same as a week ago.

There were 322 suspicions of side effect of the vaccines

The State Institute for Drug Control (SÚKL) registered 322 suspicions of possible side effects of Covid-19 vaccines on Tuesday, the number has increased by 124 per week. Most often people reported reactions such as fever, injection site reactions, fatigue, headache, muscle or joint pain. The institute published regular information on its website today. Healthcare professionals have already given people over 310,000 doses of vaccine.

Protesters called for the immediate release of Navalny

About a hundred protesters in the evening in front of Prague's Rudolfinum in Jan Palach Square called on Russia to release the opposition leader Alexei Navalny immediately and to end political repression in the country. The assembly to express support for Navalný has been held in the capital several times.

Number of illegal migrants rose last year, due to coronavirus measures

Last year, the Police detected 7,093 foreigners as illegal migrants, which is an increase of almost 25 percent compared to 2019. However, the number was greatly affected by migrants detained for violating the Ministry of Health regulations restricting the stay of foreigners due to the spread of Covid-19. Compared to the previous year, on the other hand, the number of people detained at the external Schengen border decreased.