If you are looking for winter in times of climate change, you should stop by Balderschwang. The fresh snow is piling up to eight meters in the mountain village in the Allgäu Alps. From December onwards, they follow 41 kilometers of cross-country ski trails all the way to Austria. This attracts winter sports enthusiasts. And in summer, city dwellers dreaming of nature come to the high valley, which, as we read, is practically “almost fog-free and low in pollen”. You marvel at bizarre rock formations and alpine meadows. The 400-inhabitant town has more than a thousand guest beds.
As much as nature lovers like to curve up the small road over the Riedberg Pass to Balderschwang, it is still too far for some service providers. No male or female nurse is comfortable going up to Germany’s highest municipality. The journey from Sonthofen, for example, where there is an outpatient care station, would take over 30 minutes – and only if there is no snow blocking the way, no traffic jams or road closures. That’s very far – and therefore very expensive.
Nobody has to break out in misery for the mountain idyll that has been cut off and could now become an old age trap. Because help is coming. It sits just across the border. Nurses from the Austrian Nursing Association Hittisau would be available less than a 15-minute drive away. However, these have not yet been able to bill German nursing care funds. A problem that bothers mayors and state councilors on both sides of the border so much that it was even discussed at a cross-border meeting between the districts of Oberallgäu and Lindau and the Austrian state of Vorarlberg. It was agreed that the border region should grow closer together in terms of health care. There are some bureaucratic hurdles to overcome. There is no long-term care insurance in Austria, for example, as it is known in Germany.
According to their district administrator, the Balderschwangers have always had their sights set on Austria. Many villagers were born there. The border no longer plays any role in people’s minds and hearts. The cross-country ski trails run casually across them and the Nagelfluhkette Nature Park also stretches over to the neighbors. The health system just has to copy that.