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Ben Sills & Bloomberg: “How European countries plan to reopen their economies from the coronavirus lockdown”


Ben Sills & Bloomberg: “How European countries plan to reopen their economies from the coronavirus lockdown”

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European leaders are starting to sketch out their strategy for putting the economy back to work once the coronavirus has been brought under control.

Austria and Denmark are beginning to open up some schools and shops this week and President Emmanuel Macron on Monday night told the French that he wants to begin phasing out restrictions from May 11. Chancellor Angela Merkel is due to discuss her plans with German state premiers on Wednesday while the European Commission has drafted a plan to coordinate the moves.

Governments are trying to balance the desperate need to halt the damage to the economy against the risk of a resurgence of the pandemic. The number of new cases in Europe has stabilized in recent days though more than 50,000 people have died on the continent and the fatalities continue to climb.
Spain reported the lowest number of new cases since March 20 on Tuesday, increasing pressure on the government to relax its state of emergency.

So leaders are planning a gradually easing of the restrictions on economic activity. The commission, in a draft seen by Bloomberg, warned that they will have to be prepared to re-impose lockdowns if the number of infections starts to spike again.
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Test Case

As one of the first countries in Europe to shut down, Austria is now a much-watched example of how to go about the task of re-opening itself up again -- and it will be an agonizingly slow and complicated process.

Austrians lined up outside hardware and gardening stores on Tuesday morning as the country became one of the first to ease lockdown measures. Stores of less than 400 square meters (4,300 square feet) can also reopen so long as they limit the number of people inside to maintain distancing. Face masks are mandatory in all shops as well as in public transport. If there’s no pickup in infections all other stores can reopen May 2 with schools, restaurants and hotels following in the middle of the month.

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