German minister backs off ending compulsory COVID isolation

By GEIR MOULSON
Associated Press

BERLIN (AP) — Germany’s health minister has backed off a decision to end compulsory isolation for people who test positive for COVID-19, declaring that it was a mistake and sent the wrong signal. Health Minister Karl Lauterbach said on Monday that obligatory self-isolation, usually for 10 days — which can be cut to seven days with a negative test — would be scrapped May 1 and replaced with a strong recommendation to isolate for five days. Local health offices would still have ordered infected people in health facilities to stay off work. Lauterbach said Wednesday that the idea “was a mistake I am personally responsible for.”