Germany's Merkel: We call on citizens to call off all non-essential travel

German Chancellor Angela Merkel noted on Wednesday that the country is in a "very serious" situation with regards to coronavirus and noted that the number of patients in intensive care units has doubled over past 10 days, per Reuters.

Additional takeaways

"Speed of virus's spread is especially high and we are seeing exponential growth."

"Doubling times have got shorter."

"Our healthcare system can deal with current numbers but we will hit capacity in coming weeks if this rate continues."

"In many areas, we are no longer able to track and trace because of capacity limits."

"Curve must be flattened once again."

"We know that we must now reduce contacts once again."

"Federal and state governments have agreed on new lockdown measures from November 2."

"We will review in two weeks what effect new measures have had."

"These are very tough measures we have agreed on."

"These measures apply to the entire country."

"We want to keep schools and kindergartens open."

"We have reached a point where we can't say where 75% of cases comes from."

"Private meetings to be limited to max 10 people from max 2 households."

"We call on citizens to call off all non-essential travel."

"Hotels will be open only for essential, non-touristic purposes."

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