Under the plan, decisions on how fast to reopen will be handed to the states themselves rather than the federal government, but there will be a relapse clause. States have been trying to move at different speeds, so Bavaria in the south plans to reopen restaurants on 18 May while Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania in the north plans to do that this Saturday. According to the German press agency DPA, the government wants all pupils to return to school gradually by the summer holidays.

If the plan is agreed, states will have to reimpose tougher restrictions if new infections go above 50 per 100,000 inhabitants within a week. This morning, Germany's RKI public health institute has reported another 947 new infections nationally and another 165 deaths.

There have been some 167,007 infections and almost 7,000 deaths in Germany, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.