Coronavirus update, June 14, 2021: Children 12 and up in the Czech Republic could be vaccinated in September

According to Vojtěch, there are roughly 400,000 to 500,000 people in the group between the ages of 12 and 16. "Pfizer's vaccine is the only one for these children so far, and it will be administered [to people 16 and older] until the end of the summer in these high-capacity centers. From September, we expect it to be available to GPs for children and adolescents, and now a distributor is competing to provide it," Vojtěch said. The Moderna vaccine is now going through the registration process for the group of children aged 12 and over, and GPs are already receiving it. If approved for this age group, practitioners could be vaccinating with it before the end of the holiday season.

The maximum attendance at cultural events may be raised to 2,000 indoors and 5,000 outdoors in the Czech Republic as of July 1 with certain anti-epidemic measures observed, Prime Minister Andrej Babiš said in his Sunday evening video on social media. The conditions for coronavirus testing for cultural events are the same as those applied to restaurants and people may drink and eat at cultural events, for instance, at the theater and cinema bars, but is not yet allowed to eat or drink in the auditorium.

Zlín, South Bohemia and Liberec were the only regions where the so-called incidence rate, the number of infected people per 100,000 inhabitants, was above 30. Now the figure is below 25. Vojtěch said that if Monday's data show that the downward trend continues, pupils in the remaining three regions will not have to wear respirators from Tuesday as well. Students and teachers still must wear the nose and mouth covers during breaks and in common premises, such as corridors and restrooms, at schools.

The AstraZeneca vaccine should not be given to people over 60, the head of the EU drug regulator’s Covid-19 task force, Marco Cavaleri. told Italian newspaper La Stampa. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) considers the vaccine safe for all ages but several European Union member states no longer give it to younger people under 60 due to the possibility of blood clots. While the EMA maintains the benefits of AstraZeneca outweigh the risks, Cavaleri said it would be better to use Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines, made using different technology. These have become more widely available now that the pandemic is receding and many people are already vaccinated.

There were only 42 newly confirmed cases of Covid-19 on Sunday in the Czech Republic, the lowest daily increase in almost the entire past year. The same number of new cases was last recorded June 20, 2020, which was Saturday, according to Health Ministry data. Hospitals have seen their capacities gradually unburdened. At the beginning of May, 26 percent of hospital beds with ventilators remained vacant, compared with 33 percent at present. The reproduction number R, which shows the average number of people who contract Covid-19 from one infected person, stagnated at 0.7 this morning, the same level as on Sunday. It has oscillated around 0.7 to 0.8 since the beginning of May.