Limburg sixth biggest Covid hotspot in all of Europe

Few regions in Europe had more positive coronavirus tests than Limburg. Two in every 75 residents were found to have the virus in the past two calendar weeks. Of the 211 European districts, only five had more coronavirus cases.

The European health service ECDC makes a coronavirus map every week. It is based o the number of positive tests in the past two calendar week. Thursday's map looked at the period from November 22 to December 5. Limburg had 29,766 positive tests in those weeks. Converted that is 2,664 cases for every 100,000 Limburg residents.

Compared to the previous map, the number of cases in Limburg remained virtually the same, increasing by 1.8 percent. Nevertheless, Limburg rose in the European ranking from 12th to 6th place. This is because the number of cases in other hotspots fell rapidly, especially in Austria. In Upper Austria, the number of cases decreased by 35 percent in a week and 32 percent in Salzburg.

Some Dutch provinces are also seeing a cautious decline for the first time since the start of the current coronavirus wave. In Gelderland, the number of positive tests was almost 4 percent than last week's map. The number of cases also fell in Overijssel, Flevoland, and Noord-Holland. Still, the entire Netherlands remained dark red on the map for the fourth week in a row. That is the highest warning color the ECDC has.

The map of Europe is redder than last week. In total, 132 regions are now dark red, compared to 119 last week. The 'light' spots on the map are Italy, Spain, and Romania.