As of: 01/25/2022 4:57 p.m
Who gets a PCR test and who doesn’t? A new controversy has broken out. Because some groups, such as teachers or educators, feel left out. In any case, it is still unclear when the new rules will be available.
One day after the federal-state summit on the Corona crisis, the criticism focused on the planned prioritization of the PCR tests. This is necessary because the laboratories are reaching their capacity limits.
Therefore, in the future, clinic staff and high-risk patients should be given priority in these particularly reliable tests. The plan of the federal-state group meets with a lack of understanding among those groups that do not fall into this category.
“Screaming Contradiction”
“It is of course a blatant contradiction when politicians affirm in unison that keeping schools open has top priority, but, as so often before, ducks away when it comes to specifically prioritizing students and teachers in health protection measures,” said Heinz -Peter Meidinger, head of the German Teachers’ Association, the editorial network Germany (RND).
Protests also come from educators. According to the Federal Association of Evangelical day-care centers for children, day-care center employees should also be prioritized for PCR tests. “The houses should remain open and the educators work far ahead, so we should offer them as much security as possible,” said the chairman of the association, Carsten Hauler, the news agency epd.
Brysch: Caring relatives were forgotten
The chairman of the German Foundation for Patient Protection, Eugen Brysch, told the RND that it was good to prioritize vulnerable people in the PCR test. However, “the largest nursing service in Germany” has been forgotten, namely the approximately five million caring relatives.
The deputy leader of the Left Party in the Bundestag, Susanne Ferschl, fears disadvantages for employees if PCR tests are only to be accessible free of charge for certain groups. “If PCR tests are prioritized, dependent employees are at risk of being left behind. It would be unacceptable if they had to pay for proof of infection themselves in the future,” Ferschl wrote in a statement on the plans of the federal and state governments.
Unclear when rules will come into effect
At this point in time, it is also still unclear exactly what the new rules will look like, when they will be worked out – and when they will apply. The Federal Ministry of Health is currently working on this. Lower Saxony’s Prime Minister Stephan Weil (SPD) said on NDR infothe exact regulation could still take “a few weeks”.
Baden-Württemberg’s Prime Minister Winfried Kretschmann fears that the authorities in Germany are losing track of the pandemic situation due to the lack of more accurate PCR tests. If you largely do without PCR tests in the future to prove an infection, the reporting system must also be adapted urgently, said the Green politician.
He would have liked it if the federal government had already put this adjustment on the table at the prime ministers’ conference on Monday. That must now be made up for “as soon as possible”. “Otherwise we’ll lose track of what’s happening in the pandemic,” warned Kretschmann.