Chief epidemiologist warns against softening restrictions

Speaking to public news broadcaster M1, Janos Szlavik of the Budapest South Pest Hospital said the epidemic was plateauing in Hungary, but added that hopefully cases would begin to wane if the public continued to comply with the restrictions. Szlavik also asked families to celebrate the holidays in smaller numbers.

On the topic of vaccines, he said there were several in the final stages of their evaluation and Hungarians, too, would have access to at least four or five different types in the near future.

Several countries have already begun vaccinating their citizens and vaccinations are also set to begin soon in Hungary, Szlavik said.

He said Russia’s Covid-19 vaccine was being administered in large numbers in Russia and many other countries were getting access to it for voluntary clinical trials. Meanwhile, China is testing multiple vaccines, including one similar to the flu vaccine which tests have shown to be over 80 percent effective, the chief epidemiologist said.