18 December 2020: Europe is ready to start vaccinating on 27 December.

18 December 2020: Update on The Corona Pandemic – The average daily number of people testing positive for coronavirus continues to rise. The figure is up 12% on the week. Later today the Belgian government is meeting to assess and discuss the current measures in place to curb the coronavirus. Despite initial calls to ease measures for the festive period, the meeting will most likely focus on enforcing the rules. As a matter of fact, nobody expects spectacular change in the measures over the next few months. Changes can only be expected, thanks to the vaccine, and thanks to the end of winter in particular said one of the lead virologists. It more and more starts looking that also 2021 will not be a normal year, but hopefully little by little we will be able to do more things. To ease the pain the European commission president Von der Leyen announced yesterday that the vaccination campaign across the EU will start on 27 December. Said that, any delivery of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine in December will be symbolic and limited and will be shared equally between member states. Other miscellaneous news worth mentioning was that the prime ministers of Belgium, the Netherlands and the German Bundesland of North Rhine-Westphaliaurged the people in a joined address not to cross the border and to stay at home. As both the Netherlands and Germany closed its non-essential shops one wants to avoid that people leave their hometown and fuel the pandemic by shopping in Belgium. This once again underlines the need to develop a coherent European policy. Last, the Belgian police are training sniffer dogs to detect coronavirus. The dogs, normally used to detecting explosives, should be ready by January and will most likely be deployed at airports, nursing homes and other busy places. Another proof that calamities can spur creativity. On display today is another vignette of Ghent during these unprecedented times – Ghent, Belgium.