March 17, 2021 UPDATE

A roundup of domestic and international news

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Newsroom, 17.03.2021, 20:00

COVID-19 IN ROMANIA – The Covid-19 vaccination campaign continues
in Romania. Since its start on December 27, more than 1.5 million people have
been vaccinated, mostly with Pfizer-BioNTech, but also with Moderna and
AstraZeneca. Romania has decided to continue the vaccination with AstraZeneca
shots, based on scientific data and the recommendations of the European
Medicines Agency, the coordinator of the immunization campaign, Valeriu
Gheorghita, has stated. He’s said the decision was not easy to make, given that
so many European countries have decided to temporarily halt the use of the
vaccine as a precautionary measure, following reports of blood clotting in
people who got the jab. The third stage of vaccination, for the general
population, started on Monday. For the time being, people are vaccinated in the
localities where the incidence of cases is higher than 4.5 per one thousand
inhabitants. The rest of the population can register for the waiting lists on
the electronic platform. More than 6.200 new cases of infection were reported
in Romania in the last 24 hours, as well as 89 Covid-19 related deaths. 1,266
people are currently in intensive care.

COVID-19 IN THE WORLD – Several Eastern European countries are
faced with the third wave of the pandemic, which puts pressure on health
systems again. Hungary has a new hospitalization record for COVID-19 related
cases. This country with less than 10 million inhabitants currently has over
9,800 hospitalized people, of whom about 1,000 in intensive care. Bulgaria is
the fourth country in the EU with the highest number of deaths reported in the
last 14 days, after Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary. The situation is
much worse in the Czech Republic, which is the country with the highest number
of cases of infection in the EU, ie 15.7 per one thousand inhabitants in the
last two weeks. On the other hand, on Tuesday, the European Medicines Agency
announced that it remained firmly convinced that the benefits of the
anti-COVID-19 vaccine produced by Astra Zeneca outweighed the risks. Several
countries have suspended the use of Astra Zeneca after signaling possible side
effects. Worldwide, according to worldometers, more than 121 million people
have been infected with the new coronavirus. At least 2.6 million people have
died and nearly 97 million have been declared cured since the beginning of the
pandemic a year ago.

PLAN – Romania’s President Klaus Iohannis on Wednesday attended a
working meeting on the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR). Attended
by the leaders of the ruling coalition, the meeting agreed on the plan, which
represents a chance for Romania’s development and carrying out reforms that have
been put off for so many years, the president said. The €30 billion provided in
the plan will give Romanian economy and society increased resilience in the
case of upcoming crises. Previously, the Minister of European Investments and
Projects, Cristian Ghinea, said that one of the important components of the
plan is fighting poverty. Cristian Ghinea has also mentioned a program for
reducing school dropout, which targets 1,600 schools and a bridge scholarship
program for high school students, especially those from rural areas. He also
spoke about investments to increase Romanians’ access to the health system,
including the construction of new hospitals and the modernization of existing
ones.

GOVERNMENT – The Romanian Government on Wednesday debated the draft
law banning cumulated pension-salary incomes, put up for public debate by the
Ministry of Labor. According to the labour ministry, pensioners in the public
system will be able to choose to continue working until the age of 70, during
which time the payment of the pension will be suspended. Labor Minister Raluca
Turcan said some 35,000 pensioners who are currently also receiving state-paid
salaries must choose between one of the two within 30 days of the law taking
effect. Exempted from this law will be people with certain categories of
income, such as hourly pay or copyrights. Under the draft law, members of the
Romanian Academy, Member of Parliament or workers in the local administration
will also be exempted from this law.

SEA SHIELD 21 – Over 2,400 military from eight countries, 18
battleships and 10 aircraft are taking part over March 19-29 in Sea Shield
21, the largest multinational NATO exercise hosted by the Romanian Naval
Forces in 2021 in the Black Sea area. According to the Romanian Ministry of
Defense, navy forces from Bulgaria, Greece, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania,
Spain, the United States and Turkey are taking part in drills overseen by Fleet
Command. The purpose of Sea Shield 21 is to verify and consolidate the level of
interoperability and cooperation between the Romanian Naval Forces and the
other branches of the Romanian Army, various structures within the Interior
Ministry and allied naval forces. The exercises will cover every stage of a
standard NATO maritime response to a geopolitical crisis in the region and is
aimed at proving the Romanian Army’s constant commitment to strengthening
NATO’s maritime posture against a volatile security context. After the illegal
annexation of Crimea in 2014 by the Russian Federation, the Romanian Naval
Forces recommended the introduction of this tactical exercise on NATO’s agenda
of collective defense training, in order to develop the interoperability of all
its combat forces (maritime, underwater, land and air). The first edition of
Sea Shield was held in 2015. Over the following years its agenda was adapted to
provide a swift and effective response to a whole array of threats to maritime
security and stability in the region.

BUDGETS – Parliament’s budget and finance committees on Wednesday
issued a negative opinion for the activity reports of the public TV and radio
broadcasters in 2018 and 2019. Ruling coalition MPs voted for a negative
opinion, while Social-Democrats and AUR MPs in opposition voted against. After
getting the committee’s opinion, the reports will be submitted to Parliament’s
culture committee, which must draft a report of its own, which in turn will be
submitted for debate and vote in Parliament’s plenary sitting. Should
Parliament reject the two institutions’ activity reports, their management will
be sacked. (M.I. & V.P.)