Federal Minister of Health Jens Spahn (CDU) has spoken out in favor of removing the measure of an incidence value of 50 from the Infection Protection Act in the corona pandemic. “The 50s incidence in the law has had its day,” he said on Monday in the ZDF morning magazine. The value – no more than 50 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants within seven days – applied to an unvaccinated population.
The Infection Protection Act provides for special measures for certain numbers of new corona cases. However, some federal states have already moved away from focusing on incidence. “That is why my suggestion is that this benchmark, this 50s incidence, should be swiftly removed from the law,” said the minister. The Bundestag could decide on this before the election on September 26th. “The new parameter is then hospitalization,” says Spahn. This means the number of Covid 19 patients who are in the hospital. (23.08.2021)
Incidence in NRW almost twice as high as the national average
The seven-day incidence has risen again. According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) on Monday morning, it was 56.4 – the previous day the value was 54.5, a week ago it was 36.2. The health authorities in Germany reported 3,668 new corona infections to the RKI within one day. This is evident from the figures that reflect the status of the RKI dashboard at 4:30 a.m. A week ago, the value for Germany was 2126 infections.
In North Rhine-Westphalia, the incidence is now in the three-digit range at 103.3 for the first time in a long time, which is higher than in any other federal state. The previous day there were 99.2 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants within seven days, a week ago the value was 57.2. Hamburg has the second highest value among the federal states with an incidence of 71.6.
The incidence has so far been the basis for many corona restrictions in the pandemic, for example as part of the federal emergency brake that expired at the end of June. In the future, other values such as hospital admissions are to be taken into account to a greater extent. (23.08.2021)
Baerbock considers mandatory vaccination in certain professional groups to be conceivable
In the event of a drastic worsening of the corona situation in Germany, Green Chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock considers mandatory vaccination for certain professional groups to be conceivable. “Do special professional groups such as hospitals or nursing staff or educators need to be vaccinated?” Baerbock was asked after the recording of the ARD summer interview when she answered questions from viewers in the online program Tagesschau24. “A vaccination requirement is legally, legally, legally not that easy in our country,” said Baerbock thereupon. But there are professions, for example in the armed forces, where something like this is possible.
The Green leader also referred to the situation in schools and to children who could not be vaccinated because of their young age. “You have to imagine what the alternatives are. And if the alternative is a hard lockdown, daycare centers and schools completely closed again – which was a real disaster for many families – then all other alternatives have to be on the table,” said Baerbock. But she couldn’t foresee how intense it would be. All other options have not yet been exhausted. (08/23/2021)
No baby boom due to the lockdown last year
The first lockdown during the Corona crisis hardly affected the family planning of Germans. From January to May 2021, around 315,000 children were born, 1.4 percent more than a year earlier, according to the Federal Statistical Office. In the “months marked by the onset of the corona pandemic, the development was inconspicuous,” said the authority.
The births in the first five months of the current year can be traced back to pregnancies that began during the first lockdown from the end of March to the beginning of May and in the summer months of 2020, when the pandemic-related contact restrictions were then largely lifted. “The corona measures and their relaxation in the first half of 2020 apparently did not have a direct impact on family planning,” said the demography expert at the Federal Statistical Office, Olga Pötzsch. “During the first lockdown and also in the summer months, neither significantly more nor significantly fewer children were conceived than in 2019.”
The only upward outlier is March. “These births are mainly due to pregnancies that began with the flattening of the first corona wave and the easing of the contact restrictions from the beginning of May 2020,” said Pötzsch. (08/23/2021)
Easy to put on when registering for vaccinations in some federal states
Despite restrictions for people without corona vaccination in everyday life, vaccination centers and medical practices in Germany are currently not seeing a general trend towards more vaccinations. However, some federal states reported a slight increase in the recent sharp decrease in vaccination speed. “The vaccinations pick up slightly,” said a spokesman for the North Rhine-Westphalian Ministry of Health. The second vaccinations dominated. There is no positive trend in the Westphalian-Lippe doctor’s surgeries, as a spokeswoman for the local Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians said.
In Baden-Württemberg, an increase in initial vaccinations at a low level can be observed, said a spokesman for the Ministry of Health in Stuttgart. For Bavaria, Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) reported on Thursday of the increasing number of registrations in the state’s vaccination portal. In Schleswig-Holstein there is a tendency towards a slightly increased use of vaccination offers, according to the Ministry of Social Affairs in Kiel.
In other countries there has so far been no sign of a trend reversal towards more vaccinations. Representatives of the authorities and KVs in Lower Saxony, Hesse, Hamburg, Thuringia and Saxony expressed their views accordingly. Some significant declines are reported from Brandenburg and Saxony-Anhalt. In the countries in which the summer holidays are still taking place, the doctors’ associations and authorities are expecting vaccination numbers to rise in some cases afterwards. As of this Monday, partially expanded “3G” rules will apply in Germany: access to restaurants, hairdressers, clinics, swimming pools and other indoor areas is only available to those who have been vaccinated, who have had genesis or who have tested negative when there is a high infection rate. (08/23/2021)