Status: 19.09.2021 07:16 a.m.
The vaccination campaign in Germany was to be accelerated with a week of action – hundreds of thousands were vaccinated as part of this. Health Minister Spahn is still particularly concerned about older people who have not been vaccinated.
According to Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn, hundreds of thousands of people were vaccinated in the course of the nationwide week of action on corona vaccination. “We managed a total of around 500,000 of the important first vaccinations in the week of action, about half of which is likely to be due to actions,” said the CDU politician to the newspapers of the Funke media group (Monday editions). Associations, organizations, private initiatives and other volunteers have set up around 1,500 vaccination campaigns. There may have been even more.
Concern for unvaccinated people over 60
However, Spahn expressed concern about the still large number of unvaccinated people in the older population. “Of the 24 million people over the age of 60, just under four million are still unvaccinated, which is almost every sixth in this risk group,” warned the minister. An infection of a large part of this group within a few weeks would put a lot of strain on the intensive care units, said Spahn.
With the campaign week for vaccination that started last Monday, the federal government wanted to win more people for immunization against the coronavirus and give momentum to the stalled vaccination campaign. The aim was to address as many people as possible in many places and to make vaccinations possible in a simple way.
In order to increase the speed of vaccination, the minister also spoke out in favor of tax incentives for companies that want to attract employees or customers to vaccinate with discount campaigns. “I would like to make a proposal for this together with Olaf Scholz,” said Spahn. But he refused state vaccination premiums.
Vaccinate corona and flu at the same time?
The German General Practitioner Association was meanwhile open to a simultaneous vaccination against Corona and the flu at one appointment. “From a family doctor’s point of view, two clear advantages speak in favor of administering the corona and influenza vaccinations as simultaneously as possible,” said Federal Chairman Ulrich Weigeldt of the dpa news agency. “On the one hand, there would otherwise be the risk that some patients would only perceive one of the two vaccinations.” Because they did not want to appear for several vaccination appointments in a row. “It would also be easier from an organizational point of view and at the same time reduce the possible risk of infection by avoiding an additional vaccination appointment,” added Weigeldt.
Thomas Mertens, head of the Standing Vaccination Commission (STIKO), recently had a double vaccination in one MDR-Interview considered harmless. However, individual general practitioners see it quite differently. As a precautionary measure, you continue to vaccinate against flu and corona 14 days apart. According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), there should be a general STIKO recommendation on the procedure in September.
Incidence continues to fall
Meanwhile, the 7-day incidence in Germany fell for the sixth day in a row. The RKI gave the value of new infections per 100,000 inhabitants and week on Sunday morning as 70.5. For comparison: the previous day the value was 72.0, a week ago it was 80.2. The health authorities in Germany reported 7337 new corona infections to the RKI within one day. This is evident from the numbers that reflect the status of the RKI dashboard at 04.13 a.m. A week ago the value was 7,345 infections. According to the new information, 38 deaths were recorded across Germany within 24 hours. A week ago there were eight deaths.
The number of corona patients admitted to clinics per 100,000 inhabitants within seven days was given by the RKI on Friday as 1.89 (Wednesday: 1.87). A weekly or monthly comparison is not possible due to the high number of late registrations. A nationwide threshold, from when the situation can be viewed critically, is not provided for the incidence of hospitalization, among other things because of large regional differences. The previous high was around 15.5 around Christmas time.