Germany tightens Covid rules for bars and restaurants

Germany will tighten curbs on bars and restaurants and ease quarantine rules in a bid to tackle the surging Omicron variant of Covid-19, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Friday.

Speaking after talks with Germany's 16 regional leaders, Scholz said access to bars and restaurants will be limited to people who are fully vaccinated or recovered and can also provide a negative test.

However, people who have received a booster shot will be exempted from the test requirement.

Scholz said the rules -- known as "2G Plus" -- were "strict" but necessary "to help us progress more quickly" in the fight against Omicron, which he said "will be with us for a long time".

Quarantine rules will also be relaxed to protect vital services and infrastructure from shutting down due to expected staff shortages, he said.

Anyone infected with Covid as well as their close contacts will be able to end their quarantine after 10 days if they have no symptoms.

They can be released after seven days if they provide a negative test.

Those who have received a booster will no longer have to quarantine if they have come into close contact with an infected person.

Germany has so far reported modest case numbers since the start of the year compared to many of its European neighbours, which have been engulfed by record surges.

The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) health agency recorded 56,335 new infections in the past 24 hours on Friday, with an incidence rate of 303.4 new cases per 100,000 people over the past seven days.

But Scholz said he expected that "the Omicron variant will cause infections to increase, and we will see larger numbers in the coming days and weeks than we are already seeing today".