At the end of the year, Bavaria will cease operating the vaccination centers that were built out of the ground during the Corona crisis. Health Minister Klaus Holetschek (CSU) announced this after the cabinet meeting on Tuesday. From January onwards, medical practices and pharmacies should then take over the vaccinations completely. The decision was already indicated. “Vaccination is becoming part of standard care,” said Holetschek. Now is the right time for it. This was discussed with the medical profession and also with the municipal umbrella organizations. Holetschek thanked everyone involved in the vaccination centers in the Free State – a total of 14 million vaccinations were administered there. January is said to be an “overlapping month”.
The Bavarian Association of General Practitioners and the Professional Association of Pediatricians in Bavaria recently called for the vaccination centers to no longer be funded by the state. In her opinion, the offer of the resident doctors is sufficient. The vaccination centers are a parallel structure subsidized with tax money and, unlike at the beginning of the pandemic, are no longer necessary. As Holetschek said when asked, the vaccination centers in Bavaria – currently 80 locations – have cost an estimated more than one billion euros since they were set up; half of which was taken over by the federal government.
The Minister of Health called the current corona situation “stable”, which is confirmed by the constant monitoring of his house. A central factor in monitoring is the hospital occupancy. On Tuesday, 280 patients who were admitted because of or with Corona occupied an intensive care bed in Bavaria. A red level was provided in the state government’s previous warning light for 600 occupied intensive care beds. The Corona regulation, which now has very few regulations, was extended unchanged by the cabinet on Tuesday until December.