Vaccination in Trenčín (source: TASR)
This is the Tuesday, April 6, 2021 edition of Today in Slovakia. Learn about politics, business, and other notable events of the day in Slovakia in less than five minutes. For a deeper insight into current affairs, do not miss our Last Week in Slovakia.
If you like what we are doing and want to support good journalism, buy our online subscription. Thank you.
In today's digest:
Ministry halts skipping the vaccination line
The Health Ministry adopted measures to stop skipping the vaccination line. Under the new rules, the registration will be checked by the applicant's employer. Only after then the person will be given a vaccination appointment.
The change came after a comment from a Bratislava Region doctor about some people cheating on the online waiting room app.
Although most of the currently open phases require a person to be vaccinated to be of a certain age, there is no age limit for the first phase that should include people working in professions where they are in danger of contracting the virus by working with infected cases, such as healthcare and nursing homes staff and people working at the mobile testing sites.
Lifting the measures within reach
The number of hospitalised patients infected with Covid dropped below 3,000 at the end of March. It was the last parameter necessary for switching the entire country from the black tier of the Covid automat warning system to the dark red tier.
This means it will be possible to lift some measures and reopen non-essential shops and schools for more pupils, under strict conditions. If the situation does not worsen, the first restrictions may be lifted on Monday, April 19.
Still, some experts say that everything will depend on how people behaved during the Easter holiday. The results should be seen in the coming days.
Coronavirus and vaccination developments
333 PCR tests out of 3,145carried out on April 5 were positive, which represents 10.59 percent. Of antigen tests, 515 out of 90,620 (or 0.57 percent) were positive.
The parliament approved the prolongation of the national emergencyby another 40 days. It is in place from March 20 until April 28, 2021.
Slovakia will receive another 687,590 Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine doses by the end of June as a supply from the redistribution of additional vaccines within the European Union.
The Sputnik V vaccines delivered to Slovakia are not entirely the same as the vaccines whose effects were described in the Lancet magazine. The results from Lancet were often used to advocate the use of Sputnik V in Slovakia, the Denník N daily reported.
Bratislava Region launched the Covid vaccination registration for patients suffering from chronic diseases, i.e. people after transplantation, oncology patients, people suffering from haemato-oncologic diseases, diseases of lungs and heart, immunity diseases, etc.
More than 4.8 million people in census
The Statistics Office revealed the final results of the eCensus, which ended on March 31. It was attended by altogether 4,884,007 people, which represents almost 86 percent of inhabitants.
More women than men participated in the census, at a ratio of 52:48 percent; and the inhabitants in towns were more active than those in the countryside at a ratio of 55:45 percent.
The Statistics Office said the results exceeded their expectations.
The census will now continue with the second phase, using census assistants.
Gallery of the day
Some places in Slovakia, mostly in the north and the east, woke up to the snowy morning. Cold temperatures have arrived just after the end of the Easter holidays.
Feature story for today
The second pandemic wave demonstrated its full impact on Slovakia’s economy in January’s statistics. Particularly the hospitality sector and retailers reported much worse results after the first month of this year than in the previous month.
Find out more in the latest overview of selected economic statistics published in March 2021 and check graphs of Slovak economic development.
In other news
The management of the Trnava-based carmaker Stellantis signed a new collective agreement with trade unionsfor the following four years, after 15 rounds of negotiations. It includes the payment of bonuses for the years 2020 and 2021, the increase of individual premium this year, and the increase of the basic salaries in 2023 and 2024.
The enrolment of children for the first grade of primary schools will last until the end of April. The specific date and time is scheduled by the respective schools, some of them may take place only virtually.
The Facebook post of former PM and current Finance Minister Igor Matovič, published on the International Women’s Day, was chosen by more than 800 people in a public poll as the most sexist fallacy. In the post, he thanked God for women, claiming that "our eyes, ears and hearts" would be missing them, not so say "our tummies".
The number of job offers published in March 2021 at the Profesia.sk job portal exceeded 20,000, for the first time since the coronavirus outbreak in Slovakia. It is by almost 5,000 more than in March 2020.
Year-long public transport ticket in Bratislava will be significantly cheaper from July 1, with Bratislava Mayor Matúš Vallo planning it as a motivation for people to use public transport more. Some other tickets will be more expensive.
New 400 kW connection of the electricity transmission system was launched between Slovakia and Hungary during the Easter holidays. It will allow for a connection of additional installed capacity in the total volume of 1,837 MW.
Do not miss on Spectator.sk today:
If you have suggestions on how this news overview can be improved, you can reach us at editorial@spectator.sk.
