STA, 30 July 2020 - The Slovenian contact tracing app will be localised and uploaded to GooglePlay and AppStore by Saturday, the deadline for the app to be up and running under a relevant contract, said the Public Administration Ministry on Thursday. The app is operational and currently being tested by the ministry and National Institute of Public Health (NIJZ).

The app #OstaniZdrav (#StayWell) is expected to be available for download in mid-August or the second half of August, given the experience by other countries which also based their contact tracing apps on Android and IOS mobile operating systems, said Peter Geršak, the ministry's state secretary at today's coronavirus briefing.

Saturday marks the deadline by which the app must be localised on the basis of the German Corona-Warn-App under the contract the government signed with developer RSteam, said Geršak, highlighting that the app would help stem the spread of the coronavirus and urging citizens to use it.

The institute and ministry (MJU) are currently testing the product to ensure the internalisation of the open-source app has been done right and to assess its operations, functionality and information security.

Primož Cigoj, RSteam director and a researcher at the Jožef Stefan Institute, said today that #OstaniZdrav would be easy to use and would require no special skills. After downloading it, the user will get instructions on its use and activation will be only one click away.

"The app requires nothing of you. If you get infected, you enter a 10-digit code given by an epidemiologist, and even that is voluntary," said Cigoj.

The logotip of the app

#OstaniZdrav will warn the user about the level of risk of contracting the virus using three colours - green will represent low risk, blue an unknown state indicating relevant data is still being gathered, and red increased risk, meaning contact with infected persons.

Both Cigoj and Geršak said that the issues experienced by the German app regarding exchanging data have been resolved in the Slovenian version.

The state secretary pointed out that the app would not be used for geolocation data tracking and would not have access to any personal information stored on the phone which could give away the user's identity.

The Information Commissioner has not yet given the final go-ahead for the app, said Cigoj, but he does not expect any problems. The app is currently available only in Slovenia, he added.

Later in the day, Information Commissioner Mojca Prelesnik reiterated that the legal basis for the introduction of the app was inappropriate.

The ministry's outcome estimate regarding personal data protection which did not stem from the relevant law is not enough to mitigate the shortcomings of the legislation, she said, adding that such a document should have been drawn up before endorsing the law.

She pointed out that the standpoint of all European data protection watchdogs on such legal bases was the same in that respect.

STA, 28 July 2020 - The National Blood Transfusion Centre (Zavod republike Slovenije za Transfuzijsko medicino) has issued a call to people who have recovered from Covid-19 to donate blood plasma, as it contains SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. The call was issued a few days ago and so far nine people have donated plasma, the centre told the STA on Tuesday.

"It is important that we provide treatment with hyperimmune convalescent plasma in Slovenia. Only through plasma ... donations containing specific antibodies carried by those who recovered from Covid-19 can we get this treatment," the centre said when inviting donors.

Irena Razboršek of the centre told the STA that nine donations had been made, adding that the project was still in the early stage. The donated plasma is currently in storage, as test results are awaited and the centre continues to follow the latest studies.

"We must be aware that we do not have much experience with Covid-19 and that all data is very fresh," Razboršek said. However, experience from the coronavirus Sars and Mers outbreaks shows that convalescent plasma could be a good treatment for Covid-19, she said.

Throughout the past months the centre has also been doing its best to keep replenishing the national blood bank.

After initial reluctance by donors, which drained the bank in March, the amount of blood donated in June is above-average for this time of year.

However, blood donors must be healthy and must not have visited in the past two weeks a country that is deemed unsafe in epidemiologic terms, which at the moment also includes Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

STA, 28 July 2020 - In the past two months, the majority of coronavirus cases were detected in care homes (80 infections), followed by schools (54), shops (37), health institutions (32) and restaurants, pubs and cafes (13), show the National Public Health Institute (NIJZ) data.

A total of 30 infections were confirmed among manufacturing workers, same as among administration workers. Warehouses saw 16 cases, kindergartens 14, universities 13 and the public administration 12.

Moreover, ten lorry drivers got infected with the coronavirus as well as eight construction and engineering workers, four people working in banks and three police officers.

Špela Horjak, the government deputy spokesperson for coronavirus, told the press today that as much as 40% of the cases confirmed in the past two weeks were detected in various workplaces, urging extra caution there.

Metoda Dodič Fikfak, the head of the Ljubljana UKC Institute of Occupational Medicine, meanwhile said that coronavirus clusters in companies were mostly a result of a more carefree attitude there, advising reintroducing and heeding anti-corona measures.

Whereas companies did not turn to the institute for support before the Covid-19 epidemic, there have been plenty of requests for help with work organisation after the epidemic was declared, she said, adding that the institute also had a vital role in adapting the running of Slovenia's central hospital to the new circumstances.

STA, 27 July 2020 - The Covid-19 pandemic has impacted Slovenian companies much more unequally than the latest recession in 2009. While 58% of companies have had negative effects, 17% of them had positive effects, according to a survey carried out by the Slovenian Marketing Association and the pollster Valicon.

In the autumn of 2009, 79% of the companies which participated in the recent survey had reported about negative effects of the global economic crisis in a poll carried out by the Marketing Association at the time.

Back then, positive effects were felt by 6% of the participating companies, the association said, adding that "compared to the 2009 crisis, when companies mostly did not detect positive effects of the economic crisis, a larger asymmetry is noticeable now."

Also implying that the pandemic has not affected all companies equally is the fact that only 41% of the polled companies think that they will be affected by the pandemic equally as other companies in their industry.

"In 2009, 63% of companies assessed that they will be affected to the same extent as other companies in the industry," the association said on Monday.

More than half (56%) of the recently polled companies plan to keep the marketing activity at the same level after the epidemic), 21% plan to scale back their marketing and 24% to boost it.

Almost three-quarters of the companies (71%) intend to keep the funds intended for marketing at the same level in 2021, the association said, noting that during the 2009 crisis, it was marketing budgets that had gotten the most restricted.

Among the planned marketing activities, more investment is expected in the opening of digital sales channels (62%), introducing new business models (50%), apps and web interfaces (47%) and advertising on social media (46%).

Marketing Association president Petra Čadež commented on the survey by saying that despite the negative effects of the pandemic, a positive shift in the strategic understanding of marketing in companies could be detected.

"It could be noticed that some companies have found new opportunities within the given situation and adjusted their strategies," she added.

Matjaž Robinšak of Valicon said that the time was most probably coming when marketing would have to adapt several times. "Constant search for new models and looking for new opportunities will be the key for success," he added.

The Marketing Monitor 2020 survey was carried out in June on a sample of 64 members of the Marketing Association.

STA, 27 July - The Human Rights Ombudsman has assessed that the failure to comply with the government decree on the mandatory use of face masks in enclosed public spaces cannot be penalised.

The ombudsman's opinion, issued on Monday, is based on an appeal by a citizen who does not agree with the mandatory use of face masks in closed public spaces being reintroduced on 25 June.

The citizen claims that there is no basis for the measure, because the state of emergency or epidemic has not been declared (again). She assesses the measure as a disproportionate encroachment upon the constitutionally guaranteed rights and freedoms.

The ombudsman's office said that while individuals had the right to have doubts about the effectiveness of face masks, these evaluations were in the domain of the epidemiologic profession.

This is why the decree also says that the government re-assesses every two weeks whether a specific anti-epidemic measure is still justified.

But the office noted that the decree on the mandatory use of face masks in enclosed public spaces had been adopted based on an article of the infectious diseases act which is only a general provision.

Fines for violations are meanwhile envisaged only for the failure to respect the measures adopted on the basis of a separate chapter of the infectious diseases act, it added.

It is because of this that, in the ombudsman's opinion, an individual who does not wear a face mask in an enclosed public space cannot be fined for committing an offence.

"Although the measure is worded as an obligation, it is an example of the so-called incomplete legal norm, for violations of which no penalties are envisaged," it said, noting that this was supported by a relevant decision of the Constitutional Court.

The office assessed that the government had opted to introduce mandatory wearing of masks without the possibility of penalty because it wanted to point to the duty of individuals to protect their own health and the health of others.

Considering this, the government is apparently aware that forced implementation of such an order would be ineffective or impossible, as the measure relates to all citizens and all enclosed public spaces.

"Possible sporadic penalising of only some of the violators would project an image of arbitrariness," the office concluded.

STA, 26 July 2020 - One of the Slovenian companies that has benefited from the coronavirus pandemic is Tik Kobarid, a manufacturer of disposable medical devices. Its sales revenue trumped projections by 9% in the first half of the year, which comes on top of continuous growth in recent years.

Tik generated EUR 6.5 million in sales revenue last year, 6% more than the year before and 28% more than five years ago, with exports accounting for 86% of the revenue, shows the company's report for 2019, filed with the AJPES agency for public legal records.

The positive drive continues. "At these 'odd times' we're proud to say our performance in the first half of the year trumped the expectations," the company's CEO Petra Borovinšek said, adding that she expected better-than expected results for the whole year.

Tik Kobarid was founded in 1951 as a manufacturer of sewing machine needles. A few years later, it started making hypodermic needles and by the late 1970s in had begun to expand production to several other disposable medical devices and tools.

The company went through a difficult patch after the breakup of the former Yugoslavia, its traditional market. In late 1997 it was acquired by the Cerkno-based company Certa, now Larix Invest, whose majority ownership has since passed to Postojnska Jama, the company owned by Marjan Batagelj which operates the Postojna Cave and several other tourism assets.

Tik has recently launched a new clean room to expand cleanroom production capacity to more than 40% of the output or a total of 1,500 square meters. Also this month, an additional catheter wetting unit has been launched to wrap up a two-year investment cycle in the urology line valued at EUR 2 million.

The company, which employs 159 people, phased out production of non-medical productions completely by March 2019 to focus solely on disposable medical devices. Its clients are mainly medical equipment distributors from Europe, as well as those from Turkey and the Balkans. Catheters represent 76% of the sales revenue.

STA, 26 July 2020 - Slovenian authorities issued nearly 14,000 quarantine orders during the first wave of coronavirus infections from 12 March to 31 May. The government helped repatriate some 2,300 citizens, while fines imposed for beach of lockdown and quarantine rules exceeded EUR 100,000, a government report shows.

The report, adopted by the government on Thursday for the period of the Sars-CoV-2 epidemic, which formally ended on 31 May, shows that health inspectors processed more than 1,500 reported cases of suspected breach of the government-imposed lockdown rules and the health minister-issued orders.

Inspectors conducted more than 4,800 on-site inspections, issuing more than a hundred orders prohibiting the sale of goods and services. They imposed more than 850 fines totalling over EUR 100,000.

Get the latest covid statistics for Slovenia here

The police referred a total of 13,992 quarantine order motions to the National Institute of Public Health (NIJZ), most of them for citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina (6,439) and Slovenia (4,731). Under the NIJZ's guidance, the civil protection accommodated 50 persons in hotel quarantines.

The police conducted 189,475 checks under the ban on gatherings and movement, acting on 2,534 reported cases and establishing violations in 8,458 cases. They referred 6,957 cases to health inspectors, issued 5,500 warnings and orders, while finding 88 cases of breach of public order and peace law.

However, the police did not ascertain a single instance of criminal offence of transmission of an infectious disease.

During the epidemic, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs helped 800 Slovenian citizens stranded abroad to return home in organised groups, assisting an additional 1,500 to return on their own. The government organised 24 repatriation transports by air and bus.

Between 14 March and 25 May, the police supervised the transport of 66,729 lorries across Slovenia's territory, 24,567 of them headed for Croatia and on to other countries, and a further 42,162 en route toward Hungary and further on.

These were conducted in 35 convoys of 1,428 lorries crossing Slovenia from the border with Italy to the border with Hungary, and 115 convoys numbering a total of 4,891 trucks that crossed Slovenia from Italy to the Croatian border.

According to the national Covid-19 tracking site, Slovenia had recorded 1,473 coronavirus cases by the formal end of the epidemic on 31 May, along with 108 fatalities, with two more deaths added for April later on. By midnight on 25 July, the case count had risen to 2,082, including 116 fatalities.

One of the challenges in the epidemic was securing sufficient number of hospital beds. A field hospital and a mobile medical unit were set up at the Edvard Peperko army barracks on the outskirts of Ljubljana providing a total of 120 beds, including 40 beds for gravelly ill.

From the end of February to the end of May, more than 35 million items of various equipment were dispatched from the national logistics centre in Roje on Ljubljana's outskirts.

The relief effort between 13 march and 30 May involved 205,092 disaster protection, rescue and aid staff or an average of 2,596 a day.

Slovenia also helped other countries, providing an estimated EUR 110,000 worth of personal protective equipment to North Macedonia, EUR 133,000 in material aid to Bosnia and Herzegovina via the EU's civil protection mechanism, and helping Italy's Friuli Venezia Giulia region with 500 protective garments.

As education moved into the virtual realm, schools provided more than 4,000 computers to disadvantaged kids and the Ministry of Education in addition collected more than 1,300 computers and 950 modems with the help of donors.

The Slovenian Red Cross distributed more than 300 tonnes of food products from the Fund for European Aid to the Most Deprived, as well as aid it had raised itself and with the help of donors. A further 62,421 people benefited from material and psychological and social aid provided by Slovenian Caritas.

STA, 24 July 2020- The Jožef Stefan Institute (IJS) has created a new model for forecasting the spread of the coronavirus. The institute estimates that the number of new cases is growing at an exponential rate - the figure doubles in 35 days, whereas the effective reproduction number is higher than 1, which means that "the epidemic might be getting out of hand".

In the coming period, between ten and 35 infections will be confirmed per day, projects the country's top research institute.

The institute says that the impact of imported infections is no longer relevant since the spread within the country has taken central stage now.

The seven-day average of the effective reproduction number - the number showing to how many people the infected person transmits the virus, currently stands at 1.16, whereas the three day-average is 1.55, warns the institute.

The IJS came up with four different scenarios of the epidemic unfolding, depending on the week-long average of the effective reproduction number.

If the figure was 1, meaning one secondary case per infectious case, the national death toll would increase to almost 150 by the end of September, the number of those hospitalised with Covid-19 would remain under 25 and the number of those in intensive care under 10.

Provided the effective reproduction number remained at 1.1, then the number of hospitalised Covid-19 patients would grow to nearly 50, the number of those requiring intensive care would be slightly bigger but still under 10, whereas the death toll would increase to more than 150.

In case an infected person spread the virus to 1.3 persons, 25 people would be in intensive care, close to 160 people would be hospitalised by late September and Slovenia would record almost 200 Covid-19 related fatalities.

In the event that the relevant figure stood at 1.5, same as the current three-day average, some 75 persons would require intensive care, more than 200 would be in hospital already during the second week of September, and the death toll would exceed 200 in mid-September.

Efforts should be stepped up to drive the effective reproduction number below 1 again, which would mean the epidemic is slowing down, urged the institute.

"Given the number of positive tests, the second wave of infections has so far resulted in a 70% decrease in the numbers of hospitalised patients, those in intensive care and the death toll compared to the first wave, presumably due to those infected being younger," said the IJS.

Meanwhile, the Medical Chamber said today that doctors were concerned over the developments, urging everyone to do all they could to ensure that the epidemic does not get out of hand during summer holidays when people tend to be more relaxed.

Doctors also pointed out that suspending health services again due to coronavirus concerns would put at risk many lives. They also called for protecting vulnerable groups.

Other health officials also expressed concern and called on citizens to behave responsibly, including National Public Health Institute (NIJZ) director Milan Krek and Bojana Beović, the head of the Covid-19 advisory team at the Health Ministry.

Krek told the STA that the virus was now primarily spreading from mass parties, and also from companies. "You can marry in these times, but you don't have to invite 200 people," he added.

If the number of infections starts to grow exponentially, the NIJZ will propose additional restrictive measures to the government, including limiting opening hours of shops, bars and restaurants.

What epidemiologists have noticed is that the number of infections is increasing also because infected persons do not want to reveal their contacts, Krek said, also inviting people to get tested if they have symptoms.

If the trend continues he said measures would be necessary because the capacity of the Slovenian healthcare system was limited and the authorities wanted to prevent other segments in the system from grinding to a halt.

Beović also said that the projections by the IJS were not so good, adding that the number of infected persons in Slovenia was going beyond the boundary which had been though to be manageable.

She too mentioned limits on bars and restaurants as one of the possible measures if the growth gets exponential, while measures on borders in order to prevent imported infections are also possible.

Beović said that complaining about the mandatory use of masks and hand sanitation is "nonsensical and unethical at this moment."

"If we do not adhere to this, we are in for unpleasant times," she told the STA, noting that there would also be "economic damage which will also impact human lives".

All our stories on coronavirus and Slovenia, while up-to-date statistics can be found here

STA, 24 July 2020 - Slovenia has been added to the UK's list of air bridges, which allows travel to England without needing to self-isolate, the UK Embassy in Slovenia has announced.

Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia, Slovakia and St Vincent and the Grenadines, have been added to the list of travel corridors with effect from Tuesday 28 July.

Passengers from those countries will not need to self-isolate when arriving in England.

However, destinations exempt from border measures continue to remain under constant review to keep the risk of infections from abroad low, the UK Department for Transport said.

Meanwhile, Slovenians will be required to self-isolate when entering Finland from Monday, 27 July.

This is after the Finnish government placed Slovenia on a list of countries for which restrictions apply on arrival due to the coronavirus situation, along with Austria and Switzerland.

Otherwise, Slovenians can travel to virtually all EU and EEA/Schengen countries restriction free, one rare exception is Ireland.

All our stories on Slovenia and coronavirus

STA, 23 July 2020 - Slovenia will not put Croatia on the red list of countries from which travellers must quarantine, Health Minister Tomaž Gantar said on Thursday. While he acknowledged the number of infections there has been rising, he said it was "encouraging they adopted quite a few measures after the election".

Gantar said that the National Institute of Public Health (NIJZ) had not yet proposed that Croatia be red-listed, and anyway the criteria for putting countries on one of the three lists had changed.

Get the latest from the Slovenian Police on the situation at the borders

Slovenia no longer considers just the number of infections per 100,000 inhabitants over a 14-day period, it also assesses the possibility of the infections spreading or being transmitted into other countries.

Gantar also said Slovenia would stop rapidly changing the status of countries, instead the decisions will be taken in conjunction with other countries.

Croatia is currently on Slovenia's yellow list. Citizens of those countries except for those residing in Slovenia are required to undergo a 14-day quarantine on entering Slovenia unless they are just passing through or fall under one of 18 exemptions. Slovenian arrivals are also checked more closely, as they need to prove they have not come from a red-listed country.

See more statistics on coronavirus and Slovenia here

Finland puts restrictions on those coming from Slovenia

STA, 23 July 2020 - The Finnish government has placed Slovenia on a list of countries for which restrictions apply on arrival due to the coronavirus outbreak. From Monday, the restrictions will also apply on arrivals from Austria and Switzerland.

According to a post on its web site, the Finnish government today decided to reinstate internal border controls for traffic between Finland and Austria, Slovenia and Switzerland. This is because these countries have seen an increase in the number of coronavirus infections since the previous assessment.

The Finnish government updates the list of countries for which restrictions apply about once a fortnight. EU countries already on the list are Spain, Luxembourg, Portugal, Poland, France, Sweden and the Czech Republic.

The restrictions entail a 14-day self-isolation on arrival. They can be lifted once the incidence of coronavirus has not exceeded eight new cases per 100,000 residents in the previous 14 days.

Data from Slovenia's Covid-19 tracker site, which pools official data, shows that the country with a population of two million has 257 active cases as of 22 July, out of a total of 2,033 so far confirmed.

Slovenians can travel to virtually all EU and EEA/Schengen countries restriction free, one rare exception is Ireland.