“Vaccination obligation on the brink, easing controversial – haphazardly in the Corona spring?” Asks Anne Will. How, haphazardly! There are a lot of plans because now everyone is making one!
The guests
▶︎ Karl Lauterbach (58, SPD). It’s not easy for the Minister of Health, because Germany is a bad-tempered, extremely stressful patient.
▶︎ Markus Blume (46, CSU). The Secretary General has to sign a Bavarian extra tour again.
▶︎ Jan Schroeder (41). Virology warns: “What is taking place here is an infestation of children!”
▶︎ Joachim Stamp (51, FDP). The NRW minister is not responsible for health at all, but is now planning four levels of opening.
▶︎ Elke Nobody (63). The head of a nursing home “does not want to make herself a vicarious agent” and “has to do something at breakneck speed for which I do not want to be responsible”.
The Zoff-o-Meter is alarmed, because some opponents of vaccination are no longer concerned with health and risks, but with freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, civil rights, the Basic Law or democracy as a whole…
For the overture, the Holzhackerbuam
Lauterbach was the first to swing the ax: “We can’t give the impression that we implement our own laws when we feel like it, but if we don’t feel like it, we don’t do it,” he rumbles in the direction of Bavaria.
The Minister of Justice mildly assesses the confused tyranny accusation by the Minister of Justice against Markus Söder because of the criticism of compulsory vaccination as “a bit exaggerated”, but “in substance” justified. Wow!
“The federal government did not deliver essential implementation things!” counters Blume. And: “You usually comment on this as a private person. We should clarify right at the beginning of the program whether you are speaking here as the Federal Minister of Health or as a private person!”
Markus Blume (CSU)Photo: Das Erste/ARD
Most elegant responsibility pirouette
“Polemic!” Lauterbach replies. “Don’t pretend to be more stupid than you are!” The government decided “months ago” not to submit its own draft law, and “you can’t keep saying: What does the government bring?”
“Since when is a Bavarian prime minister someone who no longer feels bound by the law?”
“A law must be implementable,” explains the CDU general. “There are significant deficits in the implementation. layoffs? Continued wage payments? What does it do to the entire care system if five percent of the workforce suddenly can no longer come?”
Most obvious suspicion
Blume’s counterattack: “The countries wanted enforcement notices. To this day, that doesn’t exist.” And with a raised index finger: “I think you’re worried that you won’t get a government majority for anything in this area in the Bundestag. That’s why you don’t want to tackle this law any more.” Boom!
Lauterbach quickly throws a smoke screen: “We want…”
“Who is we?” asks Blume. “Not the federal government!”
“My House has drafted legislation for the Members of Parliament,” explains the minister, “and we want them to be debated next week. The bills are here. Three even!”
Favorite Trick
Lauterbach knows all the tricks: It’s an “ugly legend,” he railed, that “because we don’t think we’ll get a majority, we’re working on the nursing staff.”
Hmm – no one said that! But the minister still hits the indignation keyboard. “It’s not nice!” he complains. “Resentment arises from such insinuations! You don’t have to!”
FDP Minister Stamp quickly accepted the position of second: “In a situation like this, I don’t have to play the small diamonds of the opposition,” he says angrily.
Joachim Stamp (FDP)Photo: Das Erste/ARD
most valid concerns
Nursing home manager Kainer from Freital in Saxony is clearly getting on the nerves of the political banter. Of her 81 nurses, 27 are still unvaccinated and 18 of them are waiting for more information on the new vaccines, she reports.
Her warning: If there were a ban on entry for the unvaccinated, “then we have a situation that we can no longer control!”
“It is correct in terms of content that we are still missing many specifications,” says virologist Schroeder, criticizing the guidelines provided by the ministry for the law. “This is not applicable in individual cases.” If that is not resolved, there must be an interim solution. Oof! Sounds pretty Bavarian…
Virologist Jana Schroeder Photo: Das Erste/ARD
Saddest ministerial complaint
The talk show host has heard enough and switches: “The agreement was that initially the facility-related vaccination requirement would be introduced, but then very quickly – Olaf Scholz had spoken of February – a general vaccination requirement would come,” she accuses Lauterbach. “You didn’t keep that appointment!”
“I’m just trying to solve problems,” the minister said. But then it breaks out of him: “All day long I meet people who explain to me everything that isn’t possible,” he complains. “Look, there’s one more problem… all day… wherever I go…”
“Keep your eyes open when choosing a career,” Will grins scornfully.
Hostess Anne WillPhoto: Das Erste/ARD
Hardest retreat battle
Lauterbach raises his hands: “Tomorrow we have another conference of health ministers, so I will try again to come up with solutions that we can introduce facility-related compulsory vaccination with good enforcement rules,” he announces.
Regarding the general obligation to vaccinate, the minister says: “My house really struggled to develop good draft laws.” But: “Now it’s the case that a group is hesitant to bring it to the plenary next week” – and that’s the group of all people the traffic light friends of the FDP.
Lauterbach’s prognosis: “We can discuss it now. I believe we can find a solution. But the result is open. It may also fail.” Phew!
Most snotty answer
The talk show host bites the handouts: “First there were 17 pages, on Friday there were 23 pages that should describe how to implement the law. Obviously there were questions!”
“If we don’t get there with 23 pages, I’ll make 40 pages out of it!” the minister shouts angrily. “I would also be grateful if those who see problems here would make a suggestion for a change on how to get something solved.” Ehz!
Worst prediction
“It is true that this is no longer of great importance for the omicron wave,” adds Lauterbach and spreads his arms in surrender. “Mr. Söder worked that out. We would have come up with the same idea…”
“Science assumes that omicron will not be the last variant,” the minister then warns. English researchers have now “opened four scenarios for autumn”, but none of them are good.
Lauterbach’s prognosis: “The idea that it’s becoming more and more harmless, soon a cold, that’s a very dangerous legend. That may be the case in 30 or 40 years, but not for the next ten years.”
Most hopeful claim
“We need to get out of this fear narrative,” Stamp protests. “We have to get back to a positive story!” His proposed solution: “First of all, an obligation to advise! Everyone has to make an appointment, but at the same time they also get a vaccination offer.”
And again Zoff
“It’s quite bizarre when you say that the ministry is working on two conflicting bills at the same time!” Blume marvels. “Government comes from governing! That means giving the country a direction too!”
“This is yesterday’s battle again,” the minister says.
“But you still haven’t decided anything,” adds the CSU general. “It’s tomorrow’s battle, obviously.”
Hottest crocodile tears
“I think it’s a great pity that the Union, which I always consider a state-supporting party, is refusing to discuss this (about general vaccination requirements) for party tactical reasons,” Lauterbach complained.
“There’s no question that you have to reorganize yourself after a federal election like this,” says Stamp, “but I don’t think it’s okay for an opposition reflex to bet on party political gains in such a serious crisis.” Bananas of all things!
Most violent thunderstorm
The director of the home is bursting at the seams: “If in two, three, four weeks I still have no further information that legitimizes me to act,” she thunders, “what should I say to my residents when employees are taken away from me ?
Home manager Elke Keiner Photo: Das Erste/ARD
Main Promise
Lauterbach wants to “wrestle” with the new Novavax vaccine. His announcement: “On February 21st we will receive 1.4 million cans, the following week there will be another million. We’re delivering this to the facilities, top priority. With this vaccine, many will come even closer to vaccination.”
“We are in direct contact with the company,” emphasizes the minister. “We really fight for every day where we can have it sooner. We must make offers to those who hesitate. We have to pick each one up individually. We really fight for every single caregiver.” Amen!
Last Stand
“I would wish for more planning, less panic in the near future,” teases Blume. “Perhaps you can relax a bit here tonight.”
“Of course, these 400 to 500 deaths, which you calculated that night, have led to some people already calling you the Minister of Fear,” teases the talk show host. Is Lauterbach now looking for a new justification now that the health system is no longer to be feared?
But the minister doesn’t take a joke: “I never issued a new strategy!” he says angrily. “That’s what the BILD newspaper accused me of: now all of a sudden the minister is concerned with the dead and no longer with being overworked. I didn’t say a word about that. But I openly admit: the dead are very relevant to me!”
quote of the evening
“Social workers don’t hope, social workers fight!” Elke Keiner
Conclusion
Self-optimized party profilers with glossy slogans and all sorts of clever tricks. Unfortunately, the information yield for the two practitioners remained meager, also because the talk show hostess is all too happy to light all the fuses. This was a talk show in the category “Fight up, please!”