Europe's Christmas dilemma: risk empty chairs next year?

  • 📰 YahooNews
  • ⏱ Reading Time:
  • 46 sec. here
  • 2 min. at publisher
  • 📊 Quality Score:
  • News: 22%
  • Publisher: 59%

United States Headlines News

United States Latest News,United States Headlines

Please leave a chair empty at this year's family Christmas dinner as a precaution, or face the possibility of having that chair empty forever. Alexander De Croo argued that the country's long-running, costly efforts should not be thrown away for the sake of a few warm and fuzzy hours exchanging gifts under the Christmas tree. Europe's nations are struggling to reconcile cold medical advice with a tradition that calls for big gatherings in often poorly ventilated rooms, where people chat, shout and sing together — providing an ideal conduit for a virus that has killed over 350,000 people in the continent so far.

FILE - In this Monday, Nov. 23, 2020 file photo, the traditional Christmas lights shine over closed shops in downtown Vienna, Austria. Nations are struggling to reconcile cold medical advice with a holiday tradition that calls for big gatherings in often poorly ventilated rooms, where people chat, shout and sing together, providing an ideal conduit for a virus that has killed over 350,000 people in Europe so far. FILE - In this Wednesday, Sept.

FILE - In this Thursday, Nov. 26, 2020 file photo, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, below, wears a face mask as she attends a parliament session about German government's policies to combat the spread of the coronavirus and COVID-19 disease at the parliament Bundestag, in Berlin, Germany.

Yet the desire for contact with family is such that all the horrible realities can be briefly sidelined. In France, it took a letter addressed to Santa Claus to put it in perspective. People are currently barred from visiting other households in much of the U.K and there are travel limits to high-infection areas.

“We must learn from the summer and not repeat the same mistakes," she said. "Relaxing too fast and too much risks a third wave after Christmas." “It is about hundreds of thousands, millions of meetings of 10 people,” he warned. "And the impact can be enormous."

 

Thank you for your comment. Your comment will be published after being reviewed.
Please try again later.
We have summarized this news so that you can read it quickly. If you are interested in the news, you can read the full text here. Read more:

 /  🏆 380. in US

United States Latest News, United States Headlines

Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.