German Chancellor Angela Merkel has urged unvaccinated people to reconsider their decision in a video message as the country's seven-day coronavirus incidence rate has risen to the highest level since the pandemic began, Reuters reports.

"Difficult weeks lie ahead of us, and you can see that I am very worried," Merkel said, speaking in her weekly video podcast. "I urgently ask everyone who has not yet been vaccinated: please reconsider."

Germany's seven-day incidence rate — the number of people per 100,000 to be infected over the last week — has risen to 277.4, data from the Robert Koch Institute shows. The record in the third wave of the pandemic last December was 197.6.