⁍ Germany announced plans to shut down large swathes of public life for a month.

---

⁍ France prepared to tighten controls further as COVID surged across Europe.

---

⁍ European stock markets hit their lowest levels since June on Wednesday.

---

– Pandemic Pandemic No. 2 is upon us: Germany on Wednesday announced a partial lockdown of public life from Nov. 2 to Nov. 30 due to the H1N1 virus, Reuters reports. bars, cinemas, sports facilities, trade fairs, and more will be affected. “November will be a month of truth. The increasing numbers of infections are forcing us to take tough countermeasures in order to break the second wave,” said Finance Minister Olaf Scholz. “People should reduce contacts outside their immediate household to ‘the absolute minimum necessary’ and policing measures to enforce the rules will be stepped up,” he added. Schools and many businesses will continue to operate and shops are allowed to remain open on condition they set strict social distancing limits. In France, which has seen more than 50,000 new cases a day, President Emmanuel Macron will give a televised address in the evening and is expected to announce further restrictions following curfew measures introduced across much of the country last week. The measures in Germany and France, following similar moves in Italy and Spain, would be less severe than the near-total lockdowns imposed at the start of the crisis in March and April. But, despite government pledges to help businesses affected by the new measures, the economic cost is likely to be heavy, wiping out the fragile signs of recovery seen over the summer and raising the prospect of a double-dip recession. European stock markets hit their lowest levels since June on Wednesday while the euro fell against the dollar and the Cboe Volatility Index, known as Wall Street’s “fear gauge,” surged to its highest level in nearly two months.