Every day is just beginning with new negative numbers. Again this Wednesday – more than 50,000 new infections in Germany per day, the incidence is rising continuously. “It’s pretty serious right now,” said Jens Spahn that morning at the SZ economic summit in Berlin. Because it can no longer be prevented that in ten to 14 days these around 50,000 new infections will turn into 350 to 380 patients in the intensive care units. The numbers, which are currently doubling every twelve to 14 days, are “simply too high,” said Spahn, who is still in office as Federal Minister of Health until a new government is elected. But he also adds that such a development was quite foreseeable in the summer.
But why did nothing then happen? Spahn still owes a conclusive answer on Wednesday. He points out that measures have certainly been adopted, but have not been implemented. Too often, “3G in reality often often became 0G”. During a visit to Rome in the summer, for example, he was checked more often in one day than in four weeks in Germany. The mask requirement has not been implemented consistently enough for a long time.
The abolition of free tests justifies Spahn, saying that the measure was announced early on and that, among other things, would have resulted in a further six million first vaccinations. And the closing of the vaccination centers was also the right thing to do in view of the high costs, but these now have to be started up again in a hurry.
There should be no major restrictions for vaccinated people
Now something has to happen quickly, the dynamic has to be broken, demands Spahn. He welcomes 2G plus in public life and 3G in the workplace. And he complains that the prime ministers are only now meeting to coordinate, and that they did not do so two or three weeks ago. “This prime ministerial conference is more important than almost any other. We need a wake-up call,” said the health minister. A joint signal from the federal and state governments is now necessary to shake up the population.
Spahn believes that a general vaccination requirement, which is currently being discussed, is unenforceable and cannot be monitored across the board. Even CEOs like Frank Appel from Deutsche Post DHL recently called for mandatory vaccinations. Spahn also promised in Berlin that there should be no further major restrictions for vaccinated people.
The Minister of Health has seen a lot since the outbreak of the pandemic in February 2020. He was first the hero who will get the crisis under control, then the failure who could not prevent new waves of infection – and he also infected himself. Spahn has now been blamed for the poor development of the corona situation in Germany, and he has crashed in popularity rankings. The accusation: Germany is literally stumbling into this second pandemic winter, worse prepared than ever before. Last weekend, 35 leading scientists published an open letter in which they settled the corona policy of the federal government and Spahns. The recommendations for action by science have been partially ignored in the past few weeks.
The good news: there is enough vaccine
This also had consequences for his own ambitions, Spahn is not running for the CDU chairmanship, as many expected. The 41-year-old joined the Junge Union in 1995, and was elected for the first time as a direct candidate in the German Bundestag in 2002 and was the youngest member of the Bundestag at the time. Then he went to the Federal Ministry of Finance as Parliamentary State Secretary and was appointed Federal Minister of Health in 2018. Together with Lothar Wieler, President of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), he now has to present the current Corona situation every week. What the two of them have to report is not good.
He can feel people’s anger, says Spahn. The pandemic raises many fundamental questions: “Every parents’ evening in schools is now confrontational.” But the political decisions on Corona are “not about truth, but about weighing up”. After all: Spahn had positive news: “All in all, from today’s perspective, we will have enough vaccine by the end of the year.”