Tourists travelling by ferries in Greece will have to wear face masks even when they are sitting on the open-air decks, government spokesman Stelios Petsas announced on Monday, cited by Ekathimerini. The new measure will apply from 3 to 18 August. Greece has seen a steady rise in novel coronavirus infections during the last week.

Politicians from both sides of the political spectrum are reassessing Germany's approach to protests during the pandemic, after thousands of people gathered in Berlin at the weekend at an event flouting hygiene measures, dpa reported.

Sweden's health minister Lena Hallengren and the country's Public Health Agency announced updated guidance for the autumn, which include a continued recommendation to work from home, news wires reported. According to the health agency this will help reduce congestion on public transport especially for those like service workers and medical staff who cannot work from home.

More than a dozen Italian cities were put on alert as heatwave gripped Europe in the last days. While Spain experienced record temperatures, a fire destroyed a vast area of a forest in southwest France and people in Britain filled beaches to look for coolness and escape the country's hottest day of the year so far.

Thousands of demonstrators rallied in Berlin on Saturday to protest against measures imposed in Germany to stem the coronavirus pandemic, saying they violated people’s rights and freedoms, Reuters reported. The march, estimated by police at 15,000, included libertarians, constitutional loyalists and sceptics of the science behind policies to fight the pandemic.

Poland reported on Saturday 658 new coronavirus cases, record number for a third day in a row, the Health Ministry said cited by news wires. More than 200 cases were reported in the Silesia mining region in southern part of the country, which has been grappling with an outbreak among miners.

The Commission approved on Friday both Spanish and Italian plans to set up financial schemes to tackle the coronavirus crisis. The Spanish plan includes setting up a €10bn budget fund to invest through debt and equity instruments in companies affected by the coronavirus outbreak. The Italian schemes, with an overall budget of €6bn, consist of incentives to the recapitalisation by private investors of SMEs' affected by the outbreak.

The Commission concluded on Friday exploratory talks with a pharmaceutical company to purchase a potential vaccine against Covid-19, the EU press service reported. The envisaged contract with Sanofi-GSK would provide for an option for all EU Member States to purchase the vaccine. It is envisaged that, once a vaccine has proven to be safe and effective, the EC would have a contractual framework in place for the purchase of 300 million doses, on behalf of all EU Member States.

The Commission invited more than 200 blood-collection services around the EU to apply for funding for the purchase of plasmapheresis equipment, i.e. equipment that takes plasma from donors. The aim of this action is to support the treatment of new Covid-19 patients who are fighting the disease, by increasing EU capacity to collect convalescent plasma, i.e. plasma from recovered COVID-19 patients.

EU exports to Vietnam will be taxed less as of tomorrow, 1 August, as an immediate effect of the entry into force of the EU-Vietnam trade agreement that will ultimately scrap duties on 99% of all goods traded between the two sides. Doing business in Vietnam will also become easier for European companies, the EU press service reported.