Several federal states want to extend corona rules until April 2nd

Berlin The end of most corona measures on March 20 has been canceled in many places for the time being. Last week, the FDP celebrated the date as a turning point: In regions with a normal infection situation, “we are largely returning to the normality of life,” said Minister of Justice Marco Buschmann when he and Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) drafted a revised Infection Protection Act presented. The law will be up for debate in the Bundestag for the first time on Wednesday and is due to be passed on Friday.

Because of a detail of the law, the liberal hopes will not materialize for the time being. The draft provides for a transitional period, which the federal states now want to make generous use of. In Bavaria, the cabinet decided on Tuesday that the previous 2G and 3G access rules and mask requirements should also remain in schools or in retail until April 2nd. Baden-Württemberg also wants to use the transition period, as Deputy Prime Minister Thomas Strobl (CDU) announced in Stuttgart. Thuringia and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania also want to use the time until the beginning of April to continue to enforce stricter measures.

According to the health authorities in Hamburg, the current regulation is to be extended unchanged this Friday. The background is also the end of the spring break with an expected increase in the number of infections, which would otherwise coincide with the largely end of the measures in the Hanseatic city on March 20th. In Lower Saxony, the state government wants to present a transitional regulation in the course of the week, which should apply until April 2nd.

North Rhine-Westphalia is also apparently planning to use the transitional arrangement until April 2nd. However, a concrete decision by the CDU/FDP state government is only expected once the Bundestag has voted on the future Infection Protection Act. Among other things, it is expected that in NRW the mask requirement in schools should continue to apply. The Saarland state government also extended the current regulation until March 31st. This was done as a precautionary measure in order to be able to react quickly to possible changes in federal law, the Ministry of Health announced on Tuesday.

Specifically, the draft law by Lauterbach and Buschmann provides for a two-week transition period in order to avoid gaps in regulation and protection. According to this, previous regulations of the countries such as further mask requirements or access rules such as 2G and 3G can remain in place until April 2nd – with the exception of contact restrictions or upper limits for participants for events. The transition period should also be used to adopt new rules.

Sharp criticism of Lauterbach

The countries could then rely on the planned regulations for regions with a high incidence. “The countries have to tackle it. Some states, such as Brandenburg, have now done so. They go forward and say: We’re extending almost everything we have, and then we’ll take the new hotspot regulations,” said Lauterbach on ARD. The minister has had to listen to sharp criticism in the past few days – also because his warnings about the worsening infection situation do not match the easing that has been decided.

>> We want your opinion: What easing would be justifiable in your opinion at the moment? What is your position on an extension of the corona restrictions? Write us your opinion in five sentences [email protected]. We will publish selected articles with attribution on Thursday in print and online.

The traffic light groups therefore negotiated possible changes to the Infection Protection Act (IfSG) well into the night. The Greens pushed for stricter rules. “I make no secret of it,” said parliamentary group leader Britta Hasselmann on Tuesday in Berlin. Her parliamentary group could have imagined “a stronger balance between opening perspectives on the one hand and more extensive basic protection at the same time” for the new regulations.

But that could not be done with one of the two coalition partners – the FDP was obviously meant. The deputy leader of the SPD parliamentary group, Dagmar Schmidt, also spoke of “exhausting negotiations”. It is no secret that the SPD and the Greens would have liked more comprehensive basic protection measures – “such as a general mask requirement”. As a result, there is now at least one small change, namely that the mask requirement in basic protection is extended to medical practices and facilities for outpatient surgery.

Dissatisfaction with SPD and Greens

The FDP was completely satisfied with this. A “very good compromise” was found, said FDP parliamentary group leader Christian Dürr on Tuesday. But the dissatisfaction remains, also in the ranks of the FDP. There, many would have preferred to forego all measures from March 20th. The fact that the hoped-for “Freedom Day” does not materialize is blamed by some on a looser hotspot rule. In addition, there is irritation in the FDP parliamentary group that Lauterbach is publicly encouraging the federal states to make use of the hotspot regulation as extensively as possible.

“The yardstick for the restrictions on freedom was always the protection against overloading the health system,” said the designated FDP Secretary General Bijan Djir-Sarai to the “Handelsblatt”. “If individual federal states consider enacting the hotspot regulations, which the new regulation of the IfSG correctly provides for, for the entire federal state, the state parliaments have to prove that there is a risk of the health system being overloaded throughout the federal state.” , which should be declared as a hotspot, i.e. “don’t just grow it up as you like”.

The FDP MPs had supported Buschmann in enforcing the greatest possible relaxation in the negotiations with Lauterbach. Information from the SPD that the FDP parliamentary group had put pressure on Buschmann is rejected by the Liberals. That wasn’t even necessary. The Minister of Justice and the parliamentary group agreed anyway.

Most recently, the FDP had come under public pressure because the planned easing is now falling at a time of increasing incidences. The FDP rejects the criticism. “We are currently not seeing any acute or imminent overloading of the healthcare system, even if the incidence figures are rising again, as confirmed by the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians,” said Djir-Sarai. Germany is not going its own way with the planned measures to eliminate restrictions on freedom.

“Our neighboring countries show how you can live with the virus without permanently restricting everyday life,” said the designated FDP general. The new regulation of the IfSG combines responsible action with the end of the restrictions on freedom. “That’s exactly right, because we finally have to get used to the idea that the virus will be with us for a long time.” General restrictions on freedom have long since ceased to be the answer to the Corona situation.

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