EU downgrades Covid warnings in three Dutch provinces; NL in 5th place for vaccinations

The Dutch provinces of Drenthe, Flevoland and Limburg were classified at the lowest of four coronavirus risk levels by the European Centre for Disease and Prevention. The three regions moved from Orange to Green, which the provinces of Friesland and Groningen achieved a week ago.

The ECDC updates its map every Thursday. It kept the other seven provinces at the Orange level. Per capita infection rates over the last 14 days showed that Noord-Brabant and Overijssel were close to being downgraded to Green.

That classification happens when there are fewer than 50 new coronavirus infections per 100 thousand residents during a two-week period, while the national positivity rate is below four percent. If a country has a positivity rate below 1 percent, a region can go Green with 75 or fewer per capita infections.

The Netherlands was the last European Union country to be entirely classified at Red, the second worst ranking of four levels.

Updated data provided by the ECDC also put the Netherlands in fifth place for vaccination uptake out of the 30 European Union and European Economic Area countries. It showed that 71.4 percent of the adult population has been given at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, just shy of Sweden at 71.6 percent.

The Netherlands was also in seventh place for adults fully vaccinated against the coronavirus disease, which rose to 42.7 percent. That was just below Luxembourg at 42.8 percent, and above Belgium and Germany tied at 42.3 percent.

Combined, some 60.6 percent of the EU/EEA adult population have been given at least one vaccine shot. Around 38.9 percent were considered fully vaccinated against the disease.