A regulation under which only employees in health and care professions would have to be vaccinated makes “no sense” for Health Minister Klaus Holetschek.
(Photo: Moritz Frankenberg/dpa)
After the temporary end for the general obligation to vaccinate, Bavaria’s Minister of Health Klaus Holetschek (CSU) is questioning the regulation that has already been decided in health and care professions. If it stays that way, the institution-related vaccination obligation will probably no longer make sense, said Holetschek Süddeutsche Zeitung on Friday. The day before, a general vaccination requirement had not found a majority in the Bundestag, not even for certain age groups.
He still considers vaccination to be the central tool in the fight against the corona pandemic and does not want to give up discussions about mandatory vaccination for everyone, said Holetschek; but especially in clinics and nursing homes there is already a high vaccination rate. He also warned that facility-related vaccination requirements could lead to the loss of skilled workers if staff in medical and nursing facilities can no longer do their work without vaccination protection: “We must not neglect the issue of supply security.”
In Bavaria, facility-related compulsory vaccination has so far only been enforced slowly and gradually. It currently only applies directly to new hires, in which case applicants must present proof of vaccination. For everyone else, a graduated plan applies, which provides in the first step that the facilities first report all employees who have not yet been vaccinated or have recovered.
In a second step, the health authorities should offer these people vaccination advice and give them the opportunity to reconsider their decision. Only when this reflection period has expired and there is still no willingness to vaccinate will there be a fine. As a last resort, an entry ban can be issued for the respective facility.
The Bundestag debate triggered “many disappointed and angry reactions”.
Now that the general obligation to vaccinate has failed for the time being, Minister Holetschek finds it “not fair” that employees in health and care facilities are threatened with severe consequences, while the vaccination status plays no role at all for everyone else in the profession. He therefore promises that the Free State will “be very generous” when it comes to decisions on sanctions against unvaccinated employees in clinics or homes.
As early as February, Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) had doubted the feasibility of partial vaccination and threatened to back out. The Minister of Health said that a ban on entry could only be decided in the summer at the earliest. Until then, the federal government must clarify whether it still sees a chance for general vaccination. Should the pandemic escalate again in the fall, “we shouldn’t be left defenseless”. In addition, Holetschek demands that Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) now “take the helm” and make combating the pandemic a top priority.
The Bavarian Hospital Society (BKG) meanwhile sharply criticized federal policy: “We are stunned at how little energy the federal government has mustered in the debate on general vaccination requirements,” said BKG Managing Director Roland Engehausen. Against this background, the implementation of the facility-related compulsory vaccination “for the few employees in the clinics who have not yet been vaccinated” does not “solve any more problems”. Healthcare workers are “not responsible for the pandemic and the high number of infections”.
From the point of view of the BKG, the partial vaccination obligation made sense in itself, but as a first step and as a model for the more general vaccination obligation. And: “If all other unvaccinated population groups are now completely voluntary, this one-sided mandatory review of people who are responsible for health care is frustrating across the board.”
After the debate in the Bundestag, the hospital society received “many disappointed and angry reactions” from clinics in the Free State. She therefore calls – even more specifically than in Holetschek’s considerations – to suspend the facility-related vaccination requirement and not to have any work bans issued by health authorities.