Austria is days away from placing millions of people not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 on lockdown, as daily infections are at a record high and intensive-care units are increasingly strained, Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg said on Thursday.
Around 65% of Austria's population is fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, national statistics show. Austria has the lowest vaccination rate of any Western European country apart from tiny Liechtenstein, according to European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control data.
The conservative-led government said on Friday it was banning the unvaccinated from restaurants, theatres, ski lifts and providers of "services close to the body" like hairdressers.
"A lockdown for the unvaccinated means one cannot leave one's home unless one is going to work, shopping (for essentials), stretching one's legs - namely exactly what we all had to suffer through in 2020," Schallenberg said, referring to three national lockdowns last year.