STA, 14 December 2021 - Vaccination of children aged 5 to 11 could start in Slovenia today as the advisory group on immunization at the National Institute of Public Health (NIJZ) approved a proposal by paediatricians to recommend Covid-19 vaccination for children last evening.

The paediatricians recommended vaccination for children in this age group with chronic diseases, and for those who are in contact with higher-risk persons that cannot be effectively protected by vaccination. They also believe vaccination is reasonable and safe for other children between the ages of five and eleven, paediatrician Denis Baš told the STA on Monday evening.

The group had previously recommended vaccinating children over the age of 12 as well, especially those suffering from chronic diseases, following the European Medicines Agency's (EMA) approval of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine for children in May.

Support for vaccinating children was also expressed by Slovenian paediatricians in a survey conducted between 25 November and 5 December, whose results have shown that 77% of them had already decided to vaccinate their own children against Covid-19, while another 9% planned to do so.

Baš said that vaccination of children aged 5 to 11 could start on Tuesday, when the vaccines in smaller and less concentrated doses specially adapted for children will become available at vaccination sites.

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This summary is provided by the STA: 

STA, 13 December 2021 - Low-budget airline Wizz Air has relaunched a direct air route between Ljubljana Airport and London Luton Airport after more than a year and a half of suspension due Covid-19. The carrier will operate three flights per week on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays between the two destinations.

Following the latest air route relaunch, the winter season at Slovenia's main airport includes 13 scheduled airlines providing connections with 14 destinations, said Fraport Slovenija, the airport's operator.

Passengers looking for a link with the United Kingdom can currently pick between Wizz Air and EasyJet services. The latter offers flights to London Gatwick four times a week. Wizz Air also provides routes between Ljubljana and Charleroi Airport in Belgium, two times a week.

"Even though border crossings are still restricted by numerous measures to contain the Covid-19 epidemic, demand for travel in general is increasing," said Fraport Slovenija.

In November, Ljubljana Airport saw 45,660 passengers, a 95% increase on the same month last year, when air travel was severely restricted, and a 46% decrease on November 2019.

"Final coordination is underway to prepare the next summer season flight schedule. Flight forecasts for the coming season are encouraging - the summer season should bring new features and resume some routes at Ljubljana Airport that were suspended due to the epidemic," the operator said.

Winter season flights are expected to be joined by Transavia France, linking Ljubljana and Paris Orly Airport, Finnair, operating flights to Helsinki, Lufthansa (Munich), British Airways (London Heathrow), Easyjet (London Luton), Iberia (Madrid) and Israir (Tel Aviv).

STA, 13 December 2021 - The government ban on outdoor food and drink stalls has dampened down the festive mood at Christmas markets across Slovenia as inspectors clamped down on the vendors trying to get around the restrictions. Dismayed at what they see as unfair and unlawful rules, hospitality providers are now mounting class action to claim damages. 

STA, 9 December 2021 - A pop song without which Slovenians can hardly imagine a New Year's Eve is celebrating its 50th anniversary. To mark the anniversary, a museum in Maribor honoured its singer and citizen Alfi Nipič with an exhibition which traces his 60-year career while he marked the anniversary in hospital ill with Covid-19.

The lyrics for Silvestrski Poljub were written by Dušan Velkavrh and music by Jože Privšek, while Nipič, now 77, recorded it on 8 December 1971.

The exhibition, termed I Shall Remain a Musician, is a collaboration between Nipič and the Museum of National Liberation.

It brings insight in Nipič's entire career while focussing on Silvestrski Poljub as "the crown of his songs", the museum's director Aleksandra Berberih Slana said at the opening on Wednesday.

"We're extremely happy that Alfi chose our museum as the partner for the exhibition. Fact is that the musician has left an incredible mark on the city of Maribor, Štajerska region and Slovenia over the past 60 years," she added.

The idea was that Nipič would sing at the opening, but he could not make it as he has been in hospital for Covid-19, including ten days in intensive care.

Still, he thanked the medical staff for their efforts by signing them Silvestrski Poljub in his hospital bed with an oxygen mask, posting the recording online.

Nipič inherited his talent from his mother and started singing while still in secondary school. His career started rising in the decade between 1962-1973.

The same year he recorded Silvstrski Poljub he also joined the Avsenik Brothers, the most popular Slovenian Oberkrainer or pop folk music band, until 1990.

During the 30 years he was in the band he recorded over 250 new songs, won 16 golden records and toured German-speaking countries, as well as the US and Australia, after which he went solo and formed his own pop folk music band.

His son Dejan Nipič said at the exhibition opening that his father had wanted this exhibition very much, as well as the book, which will be published in the coming months.

STA, 13 December 2021 - The number of new coronavirus cases continues to drop in Slovenia, with 677 new cases detected on Sunday, the lowest daily count since mid-October. The National Institute of Public Health (NIJZ) estimates there are about 22,100 active cases in the country.

Government data show that a further 16 Covid-19 patients died yesterday. Hospitalisations totalled 874 this morning, down by nine on the day before, including 236 in intensive care, down by seven.

The youngest hospitalised patient is 19 years old, whereas the youngest person requiring intensive care is 20 years old.

The 7-day case average dropped by 13 to 1,386 and the 14-day incidence per 100,000 population by 16 to 1,050.

The number of active cases decreased by 358 to 22,129.

The test positivity rate stood at 38.7% yesterday, down by three percentage points from a week ago. The latest daily tally of cases shows a drop of some 13% in weekly comparison.

The latest data on COVID and Slovenia can always be found here

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Two ministers in for grilling at upcoming parliamentary session

LJUBLJANA - The National Assembly is meeting for an eventful plenary session tomorrow that will culminate on Friday and next Monday with debates and votes on the opposition-sponsored motions to oust Environment Minister Andrej Vizjak and Interior Minister Aleš Hojs. The session, which will also tackle several key laws, including one dealing with red tape and one with personal income tax, will open on Monday will questions time with ministers and a revote sought by the centre-left opposition in a bid to prevent an investment promotion bill and a bill introducing additional Covid-19 measures to be rushed through parliament.

STA, 12 December - The Health Ministry has approved five of the 34 applications for recognition of professional qualifications of doctors from third countries that have been submitted this year, and eight of the 42 applications submitted last year.

Under an emergency act that came into effect ten years ago, recognition of professional qualifications from third countries can be sped up where the Health Ministry sets the maximum number of job openings based on the health providers' demand.

The upper limit for job offerings for doctors from third countries in 2019 was set at 130, of which 55 for GPs. The cap was raised in response to excessive workload faced by family doctors.

Last year the ministry set the upper limit at 257, of which up to 70 slots were available for family doctors. Of the 42 applications received, the ministry has so far approved eight, only one of which was for family medicine.

Three of the applications have been rejected or procedure has been ended, while 31 are still being handled, the ministry has told the STA.

This year the cap for openings for doctors abroad has been set at 281, of which 72 for family doctors or GPs. Of the 34 applications submitted, five have so far been approved and 26 are still pending with the remaining three set aside.

STA, 10 December 2021 - A Slovenian folk music ensemble called Štirje Kovači (Four Blacksmiths) from the northern Koroška region has made it into the Guinness Book of Records as the longest active polka music band in the world. The ensemble has been making music for nearly seven decades.

The band had been striving to get into the book for a year and a half and this week it finally received a certificate confirming its Guinness feat.

Štirje Kovači have been producing music and performing for 67 years without any breaks under the leadership of accordion player and singer-songwriter Franc Šegovc.

"We're very honoured to have got into the Guinness Book of Records. This feat is a culmination of 67 years of work, hard work," Hermina Šegovc, the wife of the bandleader, told the STA. She joined the ensemble as a singer in the early 1970s.

The band was formed in 1954 by four young boys who worked at an ironwork company in Slovenj Gradec. The ensemble, which still performs and appears on TV and radio, has seven members today. The track Kam Le Čas Beži (Where Does Time Go) is the band's best-known song.

Over the past seven decades, Štirje Kovači have recorded more than 40 albums and been performing in Slovenia and overseas, including for Slovenian communities in the US and Canada.

The band's achievements have been immortalised also by an exhibition at the Koroška Regional Museum which, Hermina Šegovc said, will soon display the ensemble's latest feat as well, its Guinness world record.

The covers and editorials from leading weeklies of the Left and Right for the work-week ending Friday, 10 December 2021. All our stories about coronavirus and Slovenia are here

Mladina: Doctors in Slovenia

STA, 10 December 2021 - Under the headline Doctors, Mladina's latest commentary looks at the lack of respect in Slovenia's society, especially of doctors, analysing their calls for changes to the payment system in healthcare and suggesting that they are being exploited by power-hungry elites who want more privatisation.

Mladina's commentary begins by noting the lack of respect and understanding in Slovenia's society, which is being felt by all people, not only doctors, who recently complained about that and about being overworked, while they advocated for better salaries.

"Doctors are finding it difficult to convince the public of the legitimacy of their claims. Their incomes are simply so high that it is hard for citizens to understand these demands. Why can they no longer convince us?" Mladina asks.

"The first problem is the excess income of individual doctors," says the weekly and points to the doctors who exploit the public healthcare system to supplement their incomes with private-sector practices.

"Of course, this impression is largely unfair to the majority of doctors: most have not usurped the public system in order to shamelessly exploit it, the vast majority are actually working hard."

But although it might seem like it, these doctors are not fighting for the public healthcare payment system, Mladina says, adding that their hardships will actually be exploited to justify further privatisation of healthcare and raising the highest salaries.

"All of this is obscene in the eyes of citizens - but that does not make the frustrations and hardships of doctors any less real, while this situation only suits those holding power in the medical ranks, as they slowly grab hold of the system piece by piece."

"The public has so far always shown that it wants to take the doctors' side, but they can no longer look the other way if they want public support. The battles against these anomalies are also their battles, which they have been avoiding thus far," concludes the commentary.

Demokracija: Inclusive language guidelines

STA, 9 December 2021 - Demokracija says in its latest editorial that it is completely irrelevant whether the European Commission has pulled the internal guidelines on inclusive language temporarily or fully, as the fact is that something like that should have never been proposed in the first place.

"Europe has not seen such an attack on Christianity since 1991, when the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe adopted the disgraceful recommendation - Contribution of the Islamic civilisation to European culture," the weekly says.

Pointing to the document presented by Commissioner for Equality Helena Dalli, Demokracija says that "these are no guidelines, but a pamphlet of a political agenda aimed at forcibly suppressing and destroying all the traditional and fundamental values of Europe".

Labelling Europe as the "most wonderful civilisation of all time", the weekly says that making interventions "in this reality and trying to erase history can only be the work of evil people".

Demokracija believes that the withdrawal of the guidelines is really only temporary and strategic, as "sooner or later they will push them through somewhere" in opposition not only to the Christian nature, but human nature in general.

"Dalli has repeatedly made it clear that she is the enemy of indigenous European nations, the heterosexual family and Christianity," the weekly adds under the headline Have a Nice Trip to the Pinkish Farout.

The reaction to the opposition to the guidelines was expected: reactionary, conservative and far-right forces are at work, the weekly says, while arguing that it was actually people with common sense who have raised their voice.

These people do not want to experiment with God's creations and traditional values, but the progressives have taken the familiar position that argues that the discourse of the former is violent and hostile.

"Normal Europeans, what is left of them, should now finally wake up and, despite their fatigue, stop allowing the madness in Brussels to continue to grow. It has all gone too far," concludes the commentary.

All our posts in this series are here