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Social curbs have broken exponential growth in pandemic: Merkel – Metro US

Social curbs have broken exponential growth in pandemic: Merkel

German Chancellor Angela Merkel addresses a news conference on COVID-19
German Chancellor Angela Merkel addresses a news conference on COVID-19 in Berlin

BERLIN (Reuters) – A partial lockdown imposed in Germany at the start of November has succeeded in breaking the exponential growth in coronavirus infections, but infection numbers must fall much further, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Monday.

Urging people to reduce their social contacts to the absolute minimum possible, she said a follow-up meeting of state and federal leaders on Nov. 25 would take bigger and further-reaching decisions on tackling the pandemic.

“The current restrictions have not yet reversed the trend, but we have broken the dynamics of new infections,” she told reporters. “The contact restrictions are the formula for success. We need more of this.”

(Reporting by Thomas Escritt and Sabine Siebold; Editing by Michael Nienaber)