opinion
Corona communication
Mertens, Laumann and the pandemic of the unspeakable
Boosters soon for everyone! Stiko boss Thomas Mertens announced the upcoming decision on Markus Lanz’s talk show. Where else?
© Bernd von Jutrczenka / Picture Alliance
She was kept silent during the election campaign, she is talked to death on talk shows, but the pandemic is still there. And how! What is missing is good communication in order to be able to set a clear course through this crisis. Instead, there’s cacophony in the perm.
To start with, a quick chat: In my late grandma’s apartment there was a motto on the wall. “Don’t be angry, just be surprised,” it said. That was ages ago, but in those corona-cloudy autumn days, the saying was definitely a motto to get through the pandemic with a bit of calm. But: Nothing lasts forever, and unfortunately the point has now been reached where the saying goes around: “Don’t be surprised, just get angry”.
After all, who is really surprised that the head of the Standing Vaccination Commission (Stiko), Thomas Mertens, let it be known in a talk show that his committee will soon be recommending booster vaccinations for all adults. But this must very well annoy you, because the booster of the immunization is one of the most important, if not the most important topic of the moment, as the pandemic management is getting out of hand once more. And one should expect that the official side will at least do everything to keep the population adequately informed, and not in a conversational tone late at night at “Markus Lanz” to briefly tell something so important.
Stiko boss Mertens: “It was common knowledge”
Mertens told something else in all seeming serenity with Lanz – and there too the ridge swells. Namely, that it was very clear to him and the professional world, due to modeling, that the next Corona wave would happen as it actually happened now, if nothing is done about it. He also told Health Minister Jens Spahn (CDU) that. Not with this full urgency, but sometimes on the phone, sometimes via the Signal messaging service. Not urgently, because everyone knew it anyway. Sounds like the old saying from the Lower Rhine: “Everyone has it, but nothing”. You don’t want to make the horses unnecessarily shy. Instead, the pandemic as a chat. You can get confused with the numbers, right? 32 children with Corona in intensive care? Or 32 died? Or is it 35? Mertens at Lanz: “It doesn’t matter.” “In his argumentative rationality, Professor Mertens does not even notice what he is saying and causing”, family doctor Christian Kröner tweeted about it – also a guest at Lanz. How true!
Speaking of the general practitioner. Mertens has recognized that Kröner and his colleagues are currently in great demand. But that has not yet arrived everywhere. Not even in politics, especially with Karl-Josef Laumann (CDU). The NRW Minister of Health made it according to a report in the “Ärzte-Zeitung” actually just at a medical fair, the Medica in Düsseldorf, to address the following demand to the medical profession: “Instead of golf course on Saturday vaccination on Saturday!” Bravo, Minister! Quickly insult those who will be important in the next few months. That’s sure to get the campaign going. How was that? “Don’t get angry, just wonder”?
“If I was misunderstood …”
Unfortunately, it doesn’t get any better. A new government, for example. These days, Katrin Göring-Eckardt (Greens) announced that the traffic light parties agreed on compulsory vaccination for certain professional groups. A little later: No agreement yet! “If I was misunderstood, …” It doesn’t matter. The corona cacophony is perming, PR and communication consultants are apparently in lockdown. It is (also) a pandemic of the unspeakable. But they will have to fix it. The only thing left for now is: get vaccinated, put on your mask, stay at home as much as possible and wonder what you should be angry about. I’ll see you when the spook is over.