Covid-19
Public health officers: End of the warning function for the app justified
The open Corona app on a smartphone shows an increased risk. photo
© Kira Hofmann/dpa
The Corona app will soon go into “sleep mode”. The Association of Medical Officers takes stock – especially for the warning option.
From the point of view of the medical officers, the end of the warnings via the federal corona app on May 1st is justified. The app was “a useful tool” for pointing out possible transmissions of infection in good time and then arranging tests, said the Federal Association of Doctors in the Public Health Service at the request of the German Press Agency.
At present, there are hardly any serious courses of the disease. The risk of having to be treated in intensive care because of a corona infection is extremely low. “In this respect, it is justified to turn off the warning function.”
As it also says in a user information in the app, it is only possible up to and including this Sunday to warn others after a positive test and to receive warnings about “risk encounters”. The app should then go into “sleep mode” on June 1 and, according to the Federal Ministry of Health, will no longer be updated for the time being. But you can keep them on your cell phone to continue using electronic vaccination certificates.
“Use should be evaluated”
The Association of Medical Officers reported that the app had helped reduce the number of transmissions of infections. She also gave directions for action. “But the benefit should still be evaluated.”
According to the app makers, there were a total of a good nine million people who used the app to issue more than 270 million warnings after a positive test. Since it was launched on June 16, 2020, the app has been downloaded more than 48 million times and up to 35 million have actively used the application.
The Association of Medical Officers explained that in the current situation “without any significant risk potential for public health” due to the Omicron variant, the breaking of infection chains is no longer a priority. Investigations were therefore still carried out in health authorities for orientation and assessment of the situation, but no longer comprehensively. Corona reports were still received to a very small extent. Monitoring data from the wastewater and the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) would therefore probably give a better overview of the infection process than PCR results that are received by the authorities.