“We lost the virus”: when Merkel lost her temper

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“We lost the virus, Germany is sitting on a powder keg.” When it is Merkel, who has always shown legendary strong nerves, when this woman has lost her temper, this is already a serious cause for concern PJens Turau for Deutsche Welle.

Germany sitting on a powder keg? Did we lose the virus? With such words, the Bildzeitung summoned Chancellor Angela Merkel from her closed-door meeting with provincial leaders. Even if only half the quotes are correct, it would mean that we have a chancellor in front of us who has finally lost his patience. “We have to be even more strict, otherwise in 14 days we will return to where we were,” Merkel said.

Did we really lose the virus?

The Chancellor is clearly truly angry, as evidenced by her reaction to the relentless desire of the Germans to travel. “At Christmas, 50,000 people flew to the Canary Islands and the Maldives,” he said. He added that he had already asked hundreds of times why such trips should not be prohibited. Who, with a touch of life in the former GDR, was always told that Germany was still a free country.

If all of these comments have been exchanged in this way, and if Merkel receives the same response each time, then her resentment is justified. After all, right-wing extremists who deny the pandemic often remember Merkel’s biography in Gedera, especially when she insists on restrictions that they resentfully reject as a violation of civil rights.

Has Germany really “lost the virus”? Currently, the numbers are falling slightly, although not fast enough, given the danger of further spread of the new strains. One thing is certain: vaccines have taken too long to be certified in the EU and supplies are currently too slow. And when the chancellor, who for years in countless negotiations on various topics has shown legendary strong nerves, when this woman lost her composure, this is already a serious cause for concern.

In January 2021, Merkel is what Americans call a lame duck. Leave the chancery this fall. They know everything and (even) for that reason their word obviously does not weigh as much as before. Not to mention that the provinces, not Berlin, are essentially responsible for implementing all the decisions. And many of the prime ministers Merkel is currently negotiating with want to be re-elected. And they know very well that people are tired of the pandemic and dream of loosening restrictions.

At the same time, Merkel herself does not want to end her career as chancellor, which in the last few meters has failed in the fight against the coronavirus. Even more so after it was first established during the financial crisis, and then in heated refugee disputes in 2015 and the following years. Finally, there was Donald Trump, whose presidency was anything but Merkel’s pleasure.

Battle with time

Let’s not forget one more thing. Angela Merkel is certainly not particularly wrong in her view that during the pandemic, people in Germany whispered, cautiously, in a pretty good situation. The current blockade, which is finally beginning to have a positive effect, is far from being as severe as, for example, the measures in Italy, Spain or France. In other words, the chancellor believes that people can swallow closed restaurants, cancel air travel and a few weeks without a new haircut. Thus, it does not positively belittle the difficult fate of many restorers and artists in the cultural field, who – like many other businessmen and their employees – are currently trembling to survive.

The fight against the pandemic in Germany is a fight against time. The slow start of immunizations rightly angers us, but no more restrictions can be imposed than the current ones. Simply because the exchanges of months resulting from the Chancellor’s meetings with prime ministers have strained everyone’s nerves. And it seems that the only hope left is that the dire scenarios of the virus mutations will not come true.

Anyway: at the moment, Germany is making a pretty helpless impression. And spring and with it the slow return to normality seem too far away for now.