Berlin The idea had not been in the world for a week before Health Minister Karl Lauterbach had to cash it in again. In order to support the nursing care funds, the SPD politician planned to forego the payment of 1.6 billion euros to the nursing care fund in the coming year and use the money to fill the existing deficit.
The criticism came promptly. The provident fund should be dried up, it said. 0.1 percentage points of the premium income are invested in the fund every year in order to stabilize the premium from 2034. During this time, many baby boomers are expected to require care.
Now the turnaround. Lauterbach does not want to suspend the payments. Instead, the amount should go to the fund all at once at the end of 2023 instead of in monthly installments as is currently the case. This is what it says in an amendment by the traffic light coalition for the hospital care relief law, which is available to the Handelsblatt. How should the cash deficit be reduced in the coming year instead? Completely unclear.
The speed with which Lauterbach initiates reforms, adapts them and sometimes cancels them again is remarkable. In addition to the nursing care funds, the statutory health insurance companies are also permanently broke. Lauterbach had announced a large-scale financial reform for this year. Instead, he was only able to push through mini-measures in his coalition that put the problem off until next year.
Top jobs of the day
Find the best jobs now and
be notified by email.
In addition, there are the promises made by the Minister for the clinics. He is planning “the biggest reform in the hospital sector for 20 years,” said Lauterbach on Monday in front of an audience of millions on the ARD program “Hart aber fair”. Lauterbach does not set the bar too high. One of his ambitions is cannabis legalization, which is complex enough to require more than a handful of government departments to work on.
>> Read here: Lauterbach wants to suspend payments for care provision funds – “Not a good omen” for pension insurance
But can he deliver? Each individual construction site is so large that it could occupy a minister’s entire term in office. Lauterbach’s predecessor Jens Spahn (CDU), for example, initiated mini-reforms such as in nursing and some larger digitization projects such as e-prescriptions and electronic patient files. Spahn was otherwise busy due to the corona crisis.
>> Read here: 20 percent of the clinics are threatened with bankruptcy: Lauterbach wants to save the hospital landscape
Although the pandemic is abating, it is still a key issue for Lauterbach – another construction site. The minister is hoping for a large-scale vaccination campaign in autumn and winter. And from his social media posts, he continues to spend a lot of time reading studies on new virus variants and the effectiveness of vaccines. “It keeps going,” he often says about his zest for action.
The Commission lacks lobbyists
In the healthcare sector, however, it is not the best reform idea that matters, but rather its implementation. The powerful interest groups are notoriously at odds, which is why it is not surprising that Lauterbach enjoys a miserable reputation in places. Some describe him as an announcer who delivers nothing or gets bogged down in the minutiae—and already sees another legislature slipping away without much-needed reforms. Others describe him as a loner, others as simply unteachable.
The profession is underpaid and there is a shortage of skilled workers.
(Photo: dpa)
Lauterbach doesn’t mind, on the contrary. He can be convinced by any suggestion that is better, he said recently, for example in the debate about the Infection Protection Act or financial aid for statutory health insurance companies. He also boasts that he largely ignores lobby noise.
>> Read here: Contributions for statutory health insurance companies must rise to a record high in 2023
Lauterbach, for example, has the proposals for his hospital reform drawn up by a commission in his ministry that has neither clinic nor health insurance representatives nor anyone from the federal states. But in the end they have to implement the measures. The criticism from many sides was correspondingly great when the first proposals were in the world – for example on day treatments that the minister wants to make possible in the clinics.
Lauterbach’s digital agenda recently showed how tough reforms can be. Last week, the only pilot region halted the introduction of the electronic prescription. The reason was a veto by the Federal Data Protection Commissioner Ulrich Kelber (SPD) in September. The digital alternative to the paper prescription should actually be available everywhere in Germany at the beginning of the year. Instead, the project has so far been a non-starter.
After all: Germany has enough vaccine for the winter
The electronic patient record (ePA) is progressing just as slowly. Lauterbach launched the opt-out procedure on Monday, which is intended to help the file achieve a breakthrough. Anyone who does not object will receive an ePA. At the same time, it was again the federal data protection officer who registered a protest. He thinks the project is “wrong in terms of data protection policy,” he wrote on Twitter.
>> Read here: Karl Lauterbach’s scorn for all those with statutory health insurance
However, Lauterbach has achieved results elsewhere. Germany is going into the winter with enough vaccine. With the Hospital Care Relief Act, which is currently in the Bundestag, a new personnel key will probably be introduced that employees have been waiting for years.
In addition, the minister took seriously the calls from the clinics, which warned of bankruptcies in view of the drastically increased energy prices and inflation. You should now get help. But the major health care reform is still pending.
More: Everyone should automatically receive e-patient files: Lauterbach is launching opt-out procedures