December the 13th, 2020 - The new Croatian coronavirus measures which involve shops and the limiting of the number of people allowed inside at any one time has created huge queues.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, as people rushed to do their Christmas shopping on Friday, long queues and crowds continued into Saturday as well, because until January the 10th, 2021, the new rules on the permitted number of people in shops and shopping centres will continue to apply. In stores smaller than 10 square metres, there can only be one customer at any given time, 24sata writes.

In many Croatian cities, queues quickly formed in front of stores, the same kind we all saw during the first wave of the pandemic when there was also a limitation on the number of customers allowed inside shops.

New Croatian coronavirus measures

Stores ranging in size from 11 to 100 square metres in size can accommodate customers provided ten square metres can be provided for each person.

Stores from 101 to 200 square metres can accommodate customers provided they provide 12 square metres per customer.

Those up to 2,000 square feet will have to provide 16 square feet per customer, and 20 square feet for each customer must be provided by stores larger than 2,000 square feet.

For shopping malls and centres, the maximum number of customers is determined so that at least 16 square metres must be provided for each customer.

All stores and shopping centres will have to display a notice at their entrances about the maximum number of customers allowed inside and ensure that the rules are implemented, or take additional measures to ensure that the stores don't have more customers inside than allowed.

It will still not be possible to sit in the corridors of shopping centres, ie stores larger than 2,000 square metres, the organised transportation of customers by bus will also not be available. Hygienic protection measures will be strengthened.

The implementation of these new Croatian coronavirus measures will be controlled by the Civil Protection, the police and the State Inspectorate.

For the latest travel info, bookmark our main travel info article, which is updated daily. 

Read the Croatian Travel Update in your language - now available in 24 languages

Join the Total Croatia Travel INFO Viber community.

ZAGREB, Dec 12, 2020 - In the past two weeks Croatia has had the largest number of active coronavirus cases per 100,000 inhabitants of all European countries, show data from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), published on Saturday.

Croatia fares worst among 31 European countries, with 1,194.3 active cases of the disease per 100,000 inhabitants in the past 14 days.

It is followed by Lithuania, with 1,146.7 cases and Luxembourg, with 1,097.7 cases.

As for the mortality rate, Croatia is fourth, with a rate of 21.7.

Bulgaria, Slovenia and Hungary are the only other European countries that have had more fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants in the last two weeks, according to ECDC data.

A total of 14,824,355 cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed in 31 European countries so far, and 369,840 patients have died.

In the last 24 hours Croatia has had 4,135 cases of coronavirus infection and 78 related fatalities, the national COVID-19 response team said on Saturday.

ZAGREB, Dec 12, 2020 - In the last 24 hours, out of 11,114 coronavirus tests performed in Croatia, 4,135, that is 37%, have returned positive, and there have been 78 COVID-related fatalities, bringing the death toll to 2,562, the country's COVID-19 crisis management team reported on Saturday.

Currently, there are 25,270 active cases, including 2,792 patients who are receiving hospital treatment, and of them 295 are placed on ventilators.

As many as 63,908 people are self-isolating.Since February 25, when the first case was confirmed in the country, 172,523 people have caught the novel virus, and so far, 872,515 coronavirus tests have been performed.

To date, 144,691 people have recovered from the infection including 3,793 recoveries in the last 24 hours.

December the 12th, 2020 - Here in Croatia, more than 136 thousand people have already contracted the coronavirus and had their positive result lab confirmed, but the CNIPH measures and rules that must be followed continue to apply to them because it is not known how long immunity from SARS-CoV-2 actually lasts.

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, a member of the Croatian Government's Scientific Advice Council, Ozren Polasek, stated that to date, no special rules for those who have already had the virus have been developed.

''We believe that it's still necessary for those people to adhere to the CNIPH measures, especially since we now know that it is possible to become infected again within a period of six months, and possibly shorter," Polasek said for RTL.

A case of reinfection with the novel coronavirus was reported in the continental Croatian town of Bjelovar where a woman contracted coronavirus twice in just three months. She had no symptoms the first time, and probably didn’t develop any antibodies either. As for immunity, it has recently been mentioned that it lasts for three to eight months.

"The claims are different because not enough time has passed to see how long such an immune response lasts," Polasek explained.

People who have had the coronavirus and no longer have symptoms can go back to work after 10 days. If they then come into contact with a positive person, they don't have to stay at home. According to the recommendation of the CNIPH, this is valid for six months. Recommendations regarding distance, disinfection and wearing masks must continue to be adhered to.

"For now, there's no evidence to suggest that immune people can't transmit the disease and that's why people who have survived COVID-19 still need to wear a mask," said Krunoslav Capak, director of the Croatian Institute of Public Health. MP Nino Raspudic, who himself had coronavirus, believes that new measures could be introduced for those who have gotten over the virus, at least while they're in a familiar environment.

"My lungs are currently weakened, but I had to wear a mask on those weakened lungs all day in Parliament and for six hours at a time, although it has been scientifically proven that I can neither become infected or transmit the virus to others at that point," he said, referencing the CNIPH measures and a perceived lack of flexibility.

People who have already had coronavirus have a somewhat easier time getting across the border. They don't have to be retested, so they can, for example, enter and leave neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina without any worries.

"People who have suffered from COVID-19 in the last three months can cross or enter the Republic of Croatia without a PCR test, but the date of arrival must be 14 days from the diagnosis of the disease," said the head of the Service for Neighbouring Countries of the Police Directorate, Tomislav Kufner. An official document on that doesn't yet exist, but some countries have introduced an immunity passport which acts as confirmation that you have had coronavirus and that you can freely travel.

Even if you have already had coronavirus, vaccination continues to be recommended for everyone. "What we now know is that the level of antibodies after the illness is proportional to the severity of the clinical picture - the sooner you have a milder form of the clinical picture, the lower the level of those antibodies and as such - the shorter the protection," said Polasek.

For the latest travel info, bookmark our main travel info article, which is updated daily. 

Read the Croatian Travel Update in your language - now available in 24 languages

Join the Total Croatia Travel INFO Viber community.

December the 12th, 2020 - The ongoing coronavirus pandemic has shaken the Croatian economy in a way that is difficult to believe could happen in this day and age. Five Croatian sectors have been hit the hardest by the pandemic and all of the restrictions that have come with it.

As Jadranka Dozan/Poslovni Dnevnik writes, in addition to belonging to Croatian sectors whose business is more exposed to the impact of limited mobility during the continuing pandemic, the extent of damage caused by this public health crisis within the realm of entrepreneurship also lies with the size of business entities in terms of their number of employees and the levels of their income.

Such a conclusion is imposed, among other things, from the structure of paid aid for the preservation of jobs from the government back during the first wave of the pandemic, which sought to weaken the blow to the economy in as much as was possible at the time.

According to an analysis done by the Fininfo portal, of the total grants paid out by the government so far, it is estimated that in the first three months of those measures, when they included the largest number of employees, around six billion kuna was paid out, after which the grants focused on the most exposed Croatian sectors, activities and entities.

Fininfo states that as much as 87 percent of the aid was paid to micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, which, they say, indicates their significantly higher exposure to damage caused by the current pandemic when compared to more resilient, larger enterprises.

To confirm this assumption, the relative exposure of a particular size of enterprise or company was also analysed, putting in the ratio of the number of employees and operating income of companies that received support in relation to those of the same rank in terms of size that didn't receive it.

The analysis included Croatian companies that submitted their annual financial reports for 2019 (which account for 84 percent of total aid received), and the findings confirmed a significantly stronger relative exposure for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises when compared to larger companies.

A significantly higher number of employees working for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises received grants compared to those who didn't, while in large companies, the situation is the other way around, say analysts led by the director of EL Koncept, which is behind the portal.

The situation looks remarkably similar when operating revenues are taken into account as a parameter. Thus, a larger part of business revenues generated by micro, small and medium-sized enterprises received grants than those who didn't and for larger companies, the situation is the other way around yet again.

"We can conclude that the current crisis has affected more than 60 percent of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises compared to 44 percent of large ones, and if we look at the entire economy, the total exposure to the pandemic stands at about 55 percent. Relatively, the most affected by it all are small and medium-sized companies, small in terms of their number of employees, and medium-sized in terms of their income,'' the analysis states.

These findings, however, suggest that in the forthcoming period, greater problems in the payment of obligations can be expected from micro, small and medium-sized enterprises. Regarding the exposure of certain Croatian sectors, it is already very clear that the hardest hit are primarily those related to tourism, as they're based on mobility which is currently difficult.

However, Fininfo also addressed a more detailed examination of the relative exposure, given the number of workers, income and the number of entities, because, they say, this provides a better insight into the actual impact of a particular sector with the pandemic. Of the five most affected sectors, four are actually directly or indirectly related to tourism.

In addition to travel agencies and travel organisers, accommodation and catering services (the preparation and serving of food and beverages), these include wholesale and retail of motor vehicles, due to the large share of sales to car rental companies which have had very little business from tourism in 2020.

The only one of the five relatively most affected Croatian sectors not related to tourism is the category of processing of wood and wood products (with the exception of furniture). The average combined impact of the crisis on these five Croatian sectors exceeds an extremely concerning 80 percent in terms of operating income and number of employees.

In contrast to those Croatian sectors which have been the most deeply affected, back during the first wave of the pandemic, the crisis had the least impact on enterprises in computer programming and consulting, telecommunications, pharmaceuticals, waste collection, treatment and disposal, and electricity and gas supply. The average combined exposure of the least affected Croatian sectors to the crisis stands at 15 percent and is far lower than the most affected sectors or the average impact that the pandemic had on the domestic economy as a whole.

For the latest travel info, bookmark our main travel info article, which is updated daily. 

Read the Croatian Travel Update in your language - now available in 24 languages

Join the Total Croatia Travel INFO Viber community.

ZAGREB, Dec 11, 2020 - After three weeks since more stringent epidemiological measures were introduced in Varazdin County, the seven-day incidence rate of new coronavirus infections has decreased by more than 10% and preliminary antigen tests in local companies have revealed a rate of 2.9% of infections.

The head of Varazdin's civil protection authority, Robert Vugrin, told a press conference on Friday that in the past 24 hours Varazdin County had registered 206 new cases of coronavirus and that 589 tests had been conducted. He said that there was a continuing decline in the share of positive cases in the number of tests taken, which in the past 24 hours was 35%.

Over the past week Varazdin County has registered 1,737 new cases of coronavirus and the seven-day incidence rate is 1,042 per 100,000 people.

There are currently 267 patients in a serious condition in Varazdin general hospital, 222 patients are in intensive care and 20 are on ventilators. Five people died as a consequence of COVID -19 in the past 24 hours.

Vugrin said that the results were visible after more stringent epidemiological measures were introduced in the county.

He explained that in the first 11 days after the measures were introduced the numbers continued to grow and nine days later a mild decline was recorded. He added that the 7-day incidence rate on 1 December was 1,169.

"Today that number is 1,042, hence it is obvious that we have recorded a fall of more than 10 per cent in the past nine days," Vugrin underlined.

County Prefect Radimir Cacic said that had the measures not been introduced the county would still have an increasing number of infections.

ZAGREB, Dec 11, 2020 - Croatian Public Health Institute (HZJZ) director Krunoslav Capak has said that the number of new coronavirus infections is still high, as is incidence, and that more than 50% of employees of care homes and their residents as well as medical workers want to get vaccinated.

"Our figures are still high and they differ from county to county. Varazdin County continues to have the worst statistics, with incidence being almost twice as high as the average incidence in the country," Capak said on Friday at a news conference held by the national COVID-19 response team.

The latest figures show that there are 4,396 new infections out of 11,687 tests. A week ago, on December 4, there were 3,955 infections out of 10,626 tests and a week before that, on November 27, there were 4,080 new cases out of 11,091 tests, said Capak.

The current 14-day incidence for the entire country is 1,183 per 100,000 population, while Varazdin, Medjimurje and Krapina-Zagorje counties have the highest incidence.

Istria, Dubrovnik-Neretva and Pozega-Slavonia counties have much lower incidence rates.

The only other EU country that has a higher incidence than Croatia is Luxembourg, according to Capak.

As for the mortality rate, Croatia is currently 16th in the EU, with a rate of 580.7 per one million inhabitants.

As for the share of positive tests in the total number of tests, in the last 14 days it has been 35.6%, and the total rate so far has been slightly above 23%, Capak said.

Antigen testing in Varazdin County, care homes

Capak also said that rapid antigen testing was underway in Varazdin County, that currently workers of the Calzedonia company were being tested and that of the 339 tests done, 10 had returned positive, which was a rate of less than 3%.

Testing has also started in care homes, and information on that will be provided on a weekly basis, the HZJZ head said.

As for the new criteria of the European Centre for Disease Control, according to which the results of fast antigen tests should be added to the number of confirmed infections as of December 3, Capak said that the ECDC did not pass laws.

He cited the example of Slovakia, where over a period of two weeks, two-thirds of the country's population were tested with rapid antigen tests and those results were not included in official statistics. 38,000 infections were found and daily figures ranged between 2,000 and 3,000, he said.

"Other countries act the same way as well, so this (ECDC criteria) is not a law. For the time being, we are carefully monitoring both sets of figures," Capak said.

Speaking of the relaxation of restrictions, Capak said that it was difficult to predict how the situation would develop, adding that there was no formula to calculate how cold weather and longer stay indoors would affect the figures.

He also stressed that many European counties that had announced relaxation of restrictions and opening of ski resorts had given up on such plans due to the bad epidemiological situation.

More than 50% of residents of care homes, medical workers want to get tested

As for vaccination lists, Capak said that the national COVID-19 team had requested family doctors and the HZJZ to provide them with data relevant for vaccination roll-out planning.

More than 50% of staff and residents of care homes are interested in getting vaccinated, and the situation in similar in health institutions for which data are available, Capak said.

Vaccination will be conducted according to priority, not all medical workers will be vaccinated but those who are in direct contact with COVID-19 patients, notably those exposed to aerosols, said Capak.

As for the storing of vaccines, Capak said that there were no problems with that and that the entire quantity of the Pfizer vaccine can be stored at the Institute of Immunology, KBC Rebro hospital and the Rudjer Boskovic Institute, while county HZJZ branches have additional storage capacity.

ZAGREB, Dec 11, 2020 - Croatia has registered 4,396 new coronavirus cases and 64 related deaths in the last 24 hours, the national coronavirus response team said on Friday morning.

A total of 2,802 patients are hospitalised, including 304 who are on ventilators. 

The number of active cases is 25,006 and 62,370 people are currently self-isolating.

Since February 25, when the first case was confirmed in the country, 168,388 people have been infected with the novel virus.

The death toll now stands at 2,484. A total of 140,898 people have recovered, including 4,177 in the last 24 hours.

To date, a total of 861,401 people have been tested for coronavirus, including 11,687 in the last 24 hours.

December the 11th, 2020 - The ongoing coronavirus crisis has dealt a heavy blow to the economy this year, and countries like Croatia which rely very heavily on tourism and hospitality have lost out tremendously. Croatian restaurants and cafes have lost an enormous 5.6 billion kuna since back in March when the pandemic first penetrated Croatia's first lines of defence.

As Jadranka Dozan/Poslovni Dnevnik wirtes, the catering and hospitality sector has found it very difficult to accept the tightening up of the epidemiological measures which put the keys in the locks of Croatian restaurants, bars and cafes. Of course, they are not the only ones, as gym owners have also had to come to terms with the impossibility of that very same situation.

The alarming situation due to the restrictions is also being felt on the skin of the event industry. As the incidence of coronavirus infection remains high, additional restrictions by the National Civil Protection Headquarters will follow at the end of this week, primarily affecting the work of traders.

The president of the National Association of Caterers, Marin Medak, is now calculating that the work ban could be extended until the end of January 2021.

In addition to the battle over compensatory assistance measures, the owners of Croatian restaurants, bars and cafes are thus turning to the topic of facing future challenges and legal solutions for the sector in talks with government representatives. However, in the meantime, they are still trying to "negotiate" with the Headquarters to at least allow those who can and want to make coffee to do so for those remaining outside and taking it away.

The Voice of Entrepreneurs Association, on the other hand, accused the Government yesterday of making the new job preservation measures into ''just another spin''. They were disappointed by the Tax Administration's instruction regarding the reimbursement of (part) of the fixed costs as part of support for the preservation of jobs.

Authorities failed fulfill the promises they made at meetings they'd held with entrepreneurs, the aforementioned association said, stating that, according to the Tax Administration, "employers should first pay their obligations, and only then will they receive a refund from the state." In this situation, they argue, for most entrepreneurs this is mission impossible because everything they had to their names from previous years was spent during the first lockdown back in spring.

One indicator of the extent of the coronavirus crisis is the worrisome fiscalisation data, and the Ministry of Finance or the Tax Administration publishes that information weekly.

It has since been revealed that starting from March, the reported turnover of Croatian restaurants and cafes reached 8.74 billion kuna by the end of November. Compared to the same period last year, it is 39% or 5.58 billion kuna less. Of course, the decline is distributed unevenly; some within the industry have sunk far more than that, and some less than the average decline in fiscalised turnover suggests. In addition, since the beginning of the year, the decline is somewhat smaller because in the first two months of 2020, before the crisis began, Croatian restaurants and cafes recorded growth.

For accommodation services, on the other hand, data on fiscalisation indicates that their performance in the period from March to November was lower than last year by almost 57 percent or 5.7 billion kuna. Last year, it exceeded 10 billion kuna, and this year, the coronavirus crisis cut down it to 4.35 billion kuna.

The value of bills/receipts issued in the transport and storage sector fell by more than half, by almost 52 percent, down to 1.3 billion kuna when compared to last year's impressive 2.7 billion kuna. More than halved turnover in year-on-year comparisons over the past nine months was also reported by activities related to culture and sports (arts, entertainment and recreation). In this group of activities, less than 603 million kuna in turnover was fiscalised, which marks a decrease of 52 percent or 664 million kuna when compared to last year's far higher 1.26 billion kuna.

During the second wave of the pandemic, unlike during the first, hairdressers and beauty salons managed to avoid locking their doors and compared to last year, they recorded a decrease in turnover by 185 million kuna or 22 percent) Slightly stronger than hairdressers and beauty salons, the category of body care and maintenance activities was hit with a drop of 35 percent.

According to the percentage drop in fiscalised turnover, the coronavirus crisis hit the real estate business far more severely. With 109 million kuna in turnover since March, the tax data on this shows that this is a year-on-year decline of as much as 280 million kuna, or more than 70 percent. Although Croatian restaurants and cafes are the loudest when it comes to losses, this too is extremely concerning.

In contrast, Information and Communications is a segment of the business sector in which entrepreneurs haven't recorded a negative impact as a result of the ongoing coronavirus crisis. However, this group of activities also recorded a decline in fiscalised turnover, albeit in single digits. The reported 1.04 billion kuna is only about 80 million kuna or a little more than seven percent less than how things stood last year.

Approximately the same percentage decrease is indicated by the data on fiscalisation for the activities of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries with 1.2 billion kuna worth of invoices issued compared to around 1.3 billion kuna's worth issued in the comparable period last year.

Entrepreneurs within the Professional, Scientific and Technical Activities in the pandemic were struck with losses amounting to about 11 percent or slightly less than 290 million kuna in turnover. At the same time, a much more drastic decline was recorded in Administrative and support service activities, which reported a turnover of only 415 million kuna, whereas it stood at more than 1.7 billion kuna in 2019.

More detailed data shows that within the trade sector, as expected, super and hypermarkets suffered the smallest decline. The turnover of the category of non-specialised stores, mainly food, beverages and tobacco products, decreased by only 1.3 percent when compared to the comparable period last year from March onwards. A moderate 6.4 percent drop in turnover was also recorded in specialised stores, mostly in the food and beverage sector, but the turnover in the non-food trade sank significantly more.

For the latest travel info, bookmark our main travel info article, which is updated daily. 

Read the Croatian Travel Update in your language - now available in 24 languages

Join the Total Croatia Travel INFO Viber community.

ZAGREB, Dec 10, 2020 - The national coronavirus response team head, Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic, said on Thursday that the relaxation of anti-COVID restrictions during the coming Christmas holidays would depend on the trend in reducing the number of infections.

"Relaxing measures can be related only to clear trends that the number of people infected is declining and currently we do not have that situation," Bozinovic said during a signing ceremony at which Germany's Ambassador to Croatia Robert Klinke donated vehicles to Croatia.

Bozinovic underlined that the numbers are continuing to increase mildly and the response team is monitoring the situation, "but that certainly will not result in any significant relaxation" he added.

Asked what the number of infected people should be for restrictions to be eased, Bozinovic said that there has to be a clear trend. "We have to see day in and day out that the trend of new infections is falling but the current daily numbers at the moment are not near that scenario," he said.

Asked if rapid antigen tests would be added to the statistics, Bozinovic recalled that antigen tests are being distributed to counties and would be used to test employees in welfare institutions, primarily aged care facilities. He added that in Varazdin tests were being conducted in large companies with a large number of employees, which seem to be hotspots for coronavirus infections.

That should provide us with an image of the number of infections according to individual communities which is essential with regard to the elderly and if we wish to take the business sector into consideration, he said.

Bozinovic said that the announced celebrations of New Year's Eve would be considered to be contrary to the current restrictions.

"Hotels need to continue functioning to cater to people attending important meetings but it would be contrary to medical indications to conduct any sort of party functions. After I read that some hotels are organising New Year's Eve parties I contacted Tourism and Sports Minister Nikolina Brnjac who said that she would pass on this message to hoteliers," Bozinovic concluded.