在新冠肺炎感染和死亡人数上升的情况下，弗拉基米尔·普京总统周三命令大多数俄罗斯人在本月晚些时候停止工作一周，他强烈敦促不情愿的公民接种疫苗。
政府冠状病毒工作队报告称，在过去24小时内有1028人死亡，这是大流行开始以来的最高数字。这使得俄罗斯的死亡人数达到226353人，是目前欧洲最高的。
普京表示，他支持内阁的提议，即从10月30日开始实行非工作时间，并延长至下周，届时七天中有四天已经是国家法定假日。他说，在一些局势最具威胁的地区，非工作时间最早可能从周六开始，并在11月7日之后延长。
“我们今天的任务是保护生命和健康并尽量减少危险感染的后果，”普京在与高级官员的视频通话中说为了实现这一目标，首先有必要减缓危机蔓延的速度，并调动更多的外汇储备卫生保健系统，目前正在高压力下工作。"
由于疫苗接种率低迷、公众对采取预防措施的态度松懈以及政府不愿加强限制，俄罗斯每日冠状病毒死亡人数连续几周飙升，上周末首次突破1000人。只有大约4500万俄罗斯人——约占该国近1.46亿人口的三分之一——接种了全面疫苗。
非工作时间应该有助于限制传播，让人们远离办公室和拥挤的公共交通，但莫斯科和许多其他城市没有限制人们去餐馆、咖啡馆、酒吧、电影和健身房。
当内阁周二提出这项措施时，许多俄罗斯人争相预订飞往黑海度假胜地的航班，以利用假期。
虽然非工作时间应该有助于通过让人们远离办公室和拥挤的公共交通来限制传播，但莫斯科和许多其他城市并没有限制人们去餐馆、咖啡馆、酒吧、电影和健身房。当内阁周二提出非工作时间时，许多俄罗斯人争相预订飞往黑海度假胜地的航班，以利用假期。
领导政府冠状病毒特别工作组的副总理塔季亚娜·戈利科娃周三强调，非工作周应该意味着限制进入餐馆、电影和其他娱乐场所，并补充说，预计每个地区的当局都会实施限制。
目前还不清楚除了国家工作人员和国有企业员工之外，还有哪些私营企业将被要求根据普京的法令停止工作。在大流行早期的一项类似措施中，经济“重要”部门的许多私营和国有企业被允许继续运营。
内阁已经起草了对企业的补偿措施，以帮助吸收经济打击，包括相当于每个工人每月最低工资的一次性付款和低息贷款。
在敦促俄罗斯人注射疫苗时，普京说，“这关系到你的生命和健康，以及你亲爱的人的健康。”
“只有两种方法可以度过这个时期——生病或接种疫苗，”他说。“还不如去打疫苗。为什么要等待疾病及其严重后果?请负责任，采取必要措施保护自己、健康和亲人。”
这位俄罗斯领导人今年早些时候接受了国产人造卫星五号疫苗，他说，他对疫苗犹豫不决感到困惑，即使是在他的亲密朋友中。
普京说:“我不明白这是怎么回事。“我们有可靠高效的疫苗。疫苗确实降低了患病、严重并发症和死亡的风险。”
尽管俄罗斯在2020年8月成为世界上第一个批准冠状病毒疫苗的国家，疫苗也很丰富，但俄罗斯人表现出不愿意接种疫苗，这种怀疑被归咎于当局发出的相互矛盾的信号。
在称赞人造卫星五号和其他三种国产疫苗的同时，国家控制的媒体经常批评西方制造的疫苗，许多人认为这一信息加剧了公众对疫苗的普遍怀疑。
在一些地区，越来越多的感染迫使当局暂停对民众的医疗援助，因为医疗机构被迫专注于治疗冠状病毒患者。
克里姆林宫发言人德米特里·佩斯科夫承认情况“非常糟糕”，指出这些地区的疫苗接种水平特别低。
到目前为止，克里姆林宫排除了像大流行早期那样的新的全国范围的封锁，这种封锁对经济造成了沉重打击，削弱了普京的声望，授权地方当局根据自己的情况决定当地的限制。
俄罗斯85个地区中的许多地区已经限制参加大型公共活动，并引入了数字代码来证明疫苗接种或既往疾病，以便进入餐馆、剧院和其他场所。一些国家规定某些公务员和60岁以上的人必须接种疫苗。
然而，在莫斯科，生活照常进行，餐馆和电影院挤满了人，人群涌入夜总会和卡拉ok酒吧，通勤者普遍无视公共交通工具上的口罩规定，尽管最近几周重症监护室已经人满为患。
医务工作者对疫苗的怀疑表示困惑。莫斯科第52医院的Natavan Ibragimova医生说:“我想到了那些不眠之夜，当时我们有大量的病人，他们甚至懒得使用平庸的保护手段。”那里的ICU已经满了。
莫斯科市长谢尔盖·索比亚宁说，60岁以上未接种疫苗的人将被要求呆在家里。他还告诉企业，从10月25日开始，让至少三分之一的员工远程工作三个月。
世界卫生组织欧洲分部的新冠肺炎事件经理凯瑟琳·斯莫伍德博士说，俄罗斯和东欧国家如保加利亚和罗马尼亚的疫苗接种水平达到或低于30%是“特别令人担忧的”
她说:“很明显，在疫苗接种率较低的国家，就死亡人数和最终住院人数而言，这是我们目前看到的严重大流行影响的地方。
政府特别工作组登记的感染总数超过800万，其官方的新冠肺炎死亡人数将俄罗斯列为世界上第五大流行病死亡国，仅次于美国、巴西、印度和墨西哥。
然而，国家统计局Rosstat也统计了不认为病毒是主要原因的死亡人数，该机构报告的大流行死亡人数要高得多——截至8月份，新冠肺炎约有41.8万人。根据这个数字，俄罗斯将是第四重灾区，领先于墨西哥。
Russians to stay off work for a week as virus deaths rise
MOSCOW -- President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday ordered most Russians to stay off work for a week later this month amid rising COVID-19 infections and deaths, and he strongly urged reluctant citizens to get vaccinated.
The governmentcoronavirustask force reported 1,028 deaths in the past 24 hours, the highest number since the start of the pandemic. That brought Russia's death toll to 226,353, by far the highest in Europe.
Putin said he supports the Cabinet’s proposal to introduce a nonworking period starting Oct. 30 and extending through the following week, when four of seven days already are official state holidays. In some regions where the situation is the most threatening, he said the nonworking period could start as early as Saturday and be extended after Nov. 7.
“Our task today is to protect life andhealthof our citizens and minimize the consequences of the dangerous infection,” Putin said in a video call with top officials. “To achieve that, it's necessary to first of all slow the pace of contagion and mobilize additional reserves of thehealth caresystem, which is currently working under a high strain.”
Russia’s daily coronavirus mortality numbers have been surging for weeks and topped 1,000 for the first time over the weekend amid sluggish vaccination rates, lax public attitudes toward taking precautions and the government’s reluctance to toughen restrictions. Only about 45 million Russians — roughly a third of the country's nearly 146 million people — are fully vaccinated.
The nonworking period should help limit the spread by keeping people out of offices and off crowded public transportation, but Moscow and many other cities haven’t curbed access to restaurants, cafes, bars, movies and gyms.
When the Cabinet proposed the measure Tuesday, many Russians rushed to book flights to Black Sea resorts to take advantage of the break.
While the nonworking period should help limit the spread by keeping people out of offices and off crowded public transportation, Moscow and many other cities haven't curbed access to restaurants, cafes, bars, movies and gyms. When the Cabinet proposed the nonworking period Tuesday, many Russians rushed to book flights to Black Sea resorts to take advantage of the break.
Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova, who leads the government coronavirus task force, emphasized Wednesday that the nonworking week should imply limiting access to restaurants, movies and other entertainment venues, adding that authorities in each region will be expected to impose restrictions.
It wasn’t immediately clear what private businesses would be required to stop working in line with Putin’s decree in addition to state workers and employees of state-owned companies. During a similar measure early in the pandemic, many private and state-owned companies in “vital” sectors of the economy were allowed to keep operating.
The Cabinet has drafted measures on compensation to businesses to help absorb the economic blow, including one-time payments equivalent to a minimum monthly pay per worker and low-interest credits.
In urging Russians to get the shots, Putin said “it's a matter of your life and health and the health of your dear ones.”
“There are only two ways to get over this period — to get sick or to receive a vaccine,” he said. "It's better to get the vaccine. Why wait for the illness and its grave consequences? Please be responsible and take the necessary measures to protect yourself, your health and your close ones.”
The Russian leader, who received the domestically developed Sputnik V vaccine earlier this year, said he's puzzled to see hesitancy about vaccines, even among his close friends.
“I can't understand what's going on,” Putin said. “We have a reliable and efficient vaccine. The vaccine really reduces the risks of illness, grave complications and death.”
Even though Russia in August 2020 became the first country of the world to authorize a coronavirus vaccine and vaccines are plentiful, Russians have shown a reluctance to get the shots, a skepticism that has been blamed on conflicting signals from authorities.
While extolling Sputnik V and three other domestic vaccines, state-controlled media were often critical of Western-made shots, a message that many saw as feeding public doubts about vaccines in general.
In some regions, mounting infections forced authorities to suspend medical assistance to the population as health care facilities were forced to focus on treating coronavirus patients.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov admitted that the situation is “very sad,” noting that the level of vaccination in those regions was particularly low.
Until now, the Kremlin ruled out a new nationwide lockdown like the one early in the pandemic that dealt a heavy blow to the economy and sapped Putin’s popularity, empowering regional authorities to decide on local restrictions, depending on their situation.
Many of Russia’s 85 regions already have restricted attendance at large public events and introduced digital codes proving vaccination or past illness for access to restaurants, theaters and other venues. Some have made vaccinations compulsory for certain public servants and people over 60.
In Moscow, however, life has continued as usual, with restaurants and movie theaters brimming with people, crowds swarming nightclubs and karaoke bars and commuters widely ignoring mask mandates on public transportation even as ICUs have filled in recent weeks.
Medical workers expressed bewilderment over the vaccine skepticism. “I think about sleepless nights when we get a huge number of patients who didn’t even bother to use banal protective means,” said Dr. Natavan Ibragimova of Moscow's Hospital No. 52, where an ICU was filled to capacity.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said unvaccinated people over 60 will be required to stay home. He also told businesses to keep at least a third of their employees working remotely for three months starting Oct. 25.
Dr. Catherine Smallwood, the COVID-19 incident manager at the World Health Organization’s European branch, said vaccination levels at or below 30% in Russia and eastern European countries like Bulgaria and Romania were “particularly concerning.”
“It’s very clear that in countries that have lower vaccine uptake, that’s where we’re seeing the serious pandemic effects at the moment in terms of deaths and people ending up in hospital,” she said.
The government task force has registered a total of more than 8 million infections and its official COVID-19 toll ranks Russia as having the fifth-most pandemic deaths in the world behind the United States, Brazil, India and Mexico.
However, state statistics agency Rosstat, which also counts deaths in which the virus wasn’t considered the main cause, has reported a much higher pandemic death toll — about 418,000 people with COVID-19 as of August. Based on that number, Russia would be the fourth hardest-hit nation, ahead of Mexico.
