Status: 10.11.2021 10:11 a.m.
In the fight against Corona, the Leopoldina has called for the expansion of the 2G regulation and compulsory vaccination in certain professions. Also an “appropriate regulation for the disclosure of the vaccination status” belongs to the demands.
The National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina has called for the expansion of 2G rules and vaccination requirements for certain professional groups. In view of the increasing number of infections, “vaccination obligations for multipliers” are now necessary, said Leopoldina President Gerald Haug to “Spiegel”. This not only included nurses, but also teaching staff and other professional groups with a lot of contact with other people.
The academy justified its claim that the corona pandemic “gained strong momentum again with the fourth wave.” The 2G rule, according to which only vaccinated or convalescent people are allowed access to events, should therefore be given “greater scope”, Haug and the Leopoldina researchers demanded.
In the occupational health and safety ordinance, “an appropriate regulation for the disclosure of the vaccination status” of employees should also be laid down. So far, employers have not been allowed to inquire about the vaccination status of their employees for reasons of data protection law.
DIVI leader demands 2G and 3G in the workplace
The demands of the Leopoldina go well beyond the plans of the traffic light parties SPD, Greens and FDP, which are to be discussed in the Bundestag on Thursday. It does not provide for mandatory vaccination for certain groups and the expansion of 2G rules should largely be left to the federal states.
The scientific director of the intensive care register of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive and Emergency Medicine (DIVI), Christian Karagiannidis, is calling for a comprehensive regulation. “What we need is 2G and also 3G in the workplace,” Karagiannidis told im daily topics-Interview. It has been seen in Europe that this has an effect on the first vaccination rate.
As a further measure, the doctor mentioned booster vaccinations. One increasingly sees very old people with breakthroughs in vaccination. That’s why old people have to be vaccinated a third time at great speed, and then young people too.
Christian Karagiannidis, head of the intensive care register, on the overloading of the clinics
Topics of the day 10:15 p.m., November 9, 2021
Marburger Bund warns of “next mistake”
The Marburger Bund sees it similarly. “If we don’t introduce a nationwide 2G rule, that would be the next mistake in fighting pandemics,” warned the largest German medical association, according to the editorial network Germany (RND).
The head of virology at the Berlin Charité, Christian Drosten, who also thinks new contact restrictions are conceivable, comes to a similar assessment of the pandemic situation. “We now have a real emergency situation at the moment,” he said in view of the situation in the intensive care units in the NDR podcast Coronavirus Update.
“We have to do something right now.” One must also discuss measures “that we actually hoped to have behind us,” said Drosten. “So we now probably have to control the infection activity again by means of contact measures – not likely, but definitely.” However, he also restricted the fact that it could be legally difficult to enforce broad general contact measures.
Lauterbach: “Lockdown or 2G rule”
Support for a nationwide regulation also comes from parts of politics: “We need either a lockdown or a 2G rule, and there will no longer be a lockdown,” said the SPD health expert Karl Lauterbach. A nationwide introduction of the 2G rule could not be enforced in the federal government without the federal states. “I therefore advise every state government to introduce 2G.” He wanted them “in all areas except basic services”.
In addition to NRW Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst (CDU), left-wing parliamentary group leader Dietmar Bartsch also spoke out in favor of a nationwide 2G regulation. “It is a matter of weighing up the interests and the question of what is the greater encroachment on fundamental rights: Another lockdown with catastrophic consequences, especially for children and families, or a nationwide 2G model,” said Bartsch.
So that stricter pandemic measures could also have an effect, SPD General Secretary Lars Klingbeil called for stricter controls, especially in the catering trade. “It must be clear: If you do not adhere to the control of the 3G or 2G certificates as an operator, you have to feel the consequences,” he told the “Rheinische Post”.