January 29, 2021 UPDATE

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Newsroom, 29.01.2021, 20:01

FIRE A fire that
ripped through the Bucharest-based Institute for Infectious Diseases ‘Matei
Bals’ killed five patients on Friday. Several wards burned down in the fire and
heavy smoke spread throughout the building. 120 patients were evacuated and
transferred to other medical units. So far the cause of the fire remains
unknown, but prosecutors have launched a manslaughter investigation. The
country’s President, Klaus Iohannis has conveyed condolences to the victims’ families.
According to Prime Minister Florin Citu all measures have been taken to bring
the situation under control. The Prime Minister’s Office inquiry team is
already conducting its own investigation but Social-Democratic leader Marcel
Ciolacu said he felt shocked, heartbroken and appalled with the Government’s
lack of action to make sure the tragedy at Piatra Neamţ must not happen again.
We recall that fire killed 10 at the Emergency County Hospital in Piatra Neamt,
northeastern Romania in November.

PROSECUTORS The Romanian Ministry of Justice on Friday selected
six candidates for the position of EPPO delegate prosecutor in Romania. The
candidates are Dana-Manuela Ana, Camelia-Elena Grecu, Constantin Irina and
Jean-Nicolae Uncheselu – all four from the National Anti-corruption Direction,
Dana-Cristina Bunea from the Prosecutor’s Office with the High Court of Cassation
and Justice and Florin Bogdan Munteanu from the Court in Iasi, north-eastern
Romania. The prosecutors will be working for the European Public Prosecutor’s
Office (EPPO) in their home countries and will have the same responsibilities
as national prosecutors in terms of investigations, criminal actions and
prosecution. The EPPO will also investigate fraud and other crimes infringing
on the EU’s financial interests. EPPO will also be investigating crimes with
EU-wide effects or crimes perpetrated by civil servants or members of European
institutions. We recall Romanian Laura Codruța
Kovesi is the head of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office.

COVID 2,737 new Covid-19 infections were registered in
Romania in the past 24 hours after more than 31 thousand tests had been carried
out nationwide, the Strategic Communication Group announced on Friday. Roughly
8 thousand of those infected are presently being treated in hospitals and 996
of them in IC units. Over 723 thousand have been infected in Romania since the
outbreak and about 90% of them have been cured. The vaccination campaign
carries on in Romania with more than half million immunized but the Health Minister
Vlad Voiculescu says the country has less vaccine doses than it needs. According
to the minister, the centres, which have immunized people from outside the
eligible categories, are going to face sanctions.

PANDEMIC The COVID-19
infection rate remains high on the continent, putting pressure on medical
systems, which is why a relaxation of restrictions would be premature, the WHO
Director for Europe, Hans Kluge, has said. The WHO official believes the high
rates of infection and the emergence of new strains of the coronavirus have
stressed the need for urgently immunizing top-priority categories of people,
but the rate of production and distribution of vaccines has fallen short of
expectations, for the time being. The vaccination process has started in 35
European states, Director Kluge argues, and some 25 million shots have already
been administered. The UK is the first European country to start a national
anti-COVID vaccination campaign. In other states, such as the Seychelles,
Iceland or Cyprus, authorities announced they would renounce testing and
quarantine for travelers who present an international vaccine certificate. Over
102 million infections have been reported globally since the start of the
epidemic and over 2.2 million people have died to the virus, the latest
worldometers.info update reveals.

(bill)