Coronavirus
The government’s plan to offer free COVID-19-tests has produced unsatisfactory results: not even a third of the people eligible in Tyrol and Vorarlberg took advantage of the initiative.
The Austria Ministry of Health has made calculations in preparation for the first vaccinations in January 2021 with an initial delivery of 250,000 doses from Biotech/Pfizer for care homes.
A mass coronavirus testing centre in Salzburg Airport, Austria. Photo: Arne Müseler via Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC-by-SA-3.0
Current affairs
The Austrian Constitutional Court has declared the headscarf ban in primary schools unconstitutional on the grounds that the current prohibition might restrict Muslim girls’ access to education.
On 12th December, the Court also passed a historic sentence: the ban on assisted suicide was declared incompatible with the right to self-determination and will be lifted from 1st January 2022.
Culture
Georg Stefan Troller turned 99 on Thursday. Check out DW’s tribute to the Austrian-Jewish eclectic intellectual.
Austrian Word of the Week
The German adjective ‘dumm’ (‘stupid’) is known in Austria as ‘deppert’.