Germany sets new record for daily COVID-19 cases

Germany on Wednesday reported a record-breaking 80,430 new COVID-19 cases, the highest daily case count for the country since the start of the pandemic. 

The previous daily record was set on Nov. 26 with more than 76,000 cases, according to Reuters.

The seven-day case rate in the European nation was also up to 407.5 per 100,000 people on Wednesday compared to 387.9 on Tuesday, Reuters added.

Just under 75 percent of Germany’s population has received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, a lesser rate than some other parts of Europe, the news service added.

Last month, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced that the country would move to limit private gatherings to 10 people and close large events like soccer games to spectators in order to combat a spike in COVID-19 cases fueled by the highly contagious omicron variant.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that more than half of Europe’s population may be infected with omicron in the upcoming weeks.

“At this rate, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation forecasts that more than 50 percent of the population in the region will be infected with omicron in the next six to eight weeks,” the regional director for the WHO in Europe, Hans Kluge, said at a press conference on Wednesday.