STORY: The Bundestag passed changes to the Infection Protection Act on Thursday with the votes of the SPD, FDP and Greens. The traffic light coalition thus enables the federal states to adopt new measures if the number of infections increases. Lockdowns and general school closures are therefore no longer among the instruments that countries are permitted to use. Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach was satisfied: “This is a very, very important decision, because this time we will start the autumn better than last autumn. I believe that we will be well prepared for the pandemic.” He defended the abolition of the mask requirement on planes: “Masks on planes account for maybe one percent of the protective measures. So that doesn’t annoy me at all. It’s epidemiological, I think we’ve actually become more careful and better with the measures. At the very end we managed to get FFP2 masks to be used in practices, in dental practices, in day clinics, in dialysis facilities. Well, if you look at the course of the discussion now, then I think the end result is very good. And so, the masks on the plane don’t play a major role. If we get really high numbers of cases, we can introduce the masks on the plane at any time by statutory order.” However, the FFP2 obligation should remain in local public transport. Without the renewed changes to the Infection Protection Act, all protection rules would have expired on September 23. Protests broke out in front of the Reichstag building during the debate. The demonstrators expressed their dissatisfaction with any tightening of corona measures and criticized the policies of the federal government.