Danish Prime Minister Sets April as Turning Point in Virus Fight

(Bloomberg) --

Denmark will probably reach a turning point in the fight against the pandemic in early April, Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said.

“I think the worst year is behind us but we must expect that the most difficult months are still ahead of us,” the Social Democrat premier said in her New Year speech broadcast on Friday. She said Easter Sunday, on April 4, will “not be the end but a turning point,” helped by vaccinations and better weather conditions.

Read more: Denmark Extends Lockdown as Crisis Now Seen Worse Than in Spring

The Nordic country started its vaccination program on Dec. 27 and earlier on Friday, Queen Margrethe II of Denmark announced that she had received her first doze. The 80-year-old monarch is among the first 1% of the population to begin the process. Still, on the last day of 2020 Denmark registered a record-high 42 deaths related to Covid-19 and some hospitals warn they face a shortage of ICU beds if hospitalizations continue to rise.

Frederiksen said Denmark has so far avoided the large economic setback predicted in the spring and she noted that more than half of the jobs lost during the crisis have been won back so far.

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