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Angela Merkel had a deja vu. “Do we want to take a bold step,” the Chancellor asked the country’s leaders, “or do we want to meet again week after week like in the spring?” There are no answers.
But that he had to ask the question has already been shown: at the height of the Corona crisis at the Foreign Ministry on Wednesday, not everyone was as deeply penetrated by the gravity of the situation as the landlady. Merkel did everything possible. Even calling the prime ministers personally to Berlin was a signal both internally and externally. For four months, the Bund-Länder-Rounds were only seen virtually, with all the downsides that a video switch brings: broken microphones, shaky images, participants who are outside, and others who might be there in secret. “When you switch, you never know who is listening,” said Michael Kretschmer of Saxony on Wednesday. Some newspapers seemed to have been in the picture at the last meeting.
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But if Merkel had hoped it would be easier to communicate face-to-face, she had to admit it again: Prime Minister conferences have their own group dynamics. Many of the princes of the country arrived already loaded. Among the SPD heads of government, they were angry that Merkel had consulted with Union colleagues for hours the night before. The SPD rulers could only see the proposal with which the head of the Foreign Ministry, Helge Braun (CDU), entered the round shortly before the round.
No landline numbers but a reminder
After all, Braun had refrained from proposing figures in the foreseeable controversial places: participants in family celebrations, upper limits for events in risk areas – there were only “XX” everywhere. The text contained a clear warning: the decisions to be made had a “historical dimension”: States that handled the pandemic better than others would also emerge better from the crisis economically.
But neither was it about unity on the part of the Union. Kretschmer arrived with the stated intention of repealing the controversial accommodation ban. Armin Laschet came with the announcement that it would no longer be used in North Rhine-Westphalia. The CDU man was on every broadcast channel in the morning. “The problem with the accommodation ban is that many citizens do not understand the rules,” Laschet complained in the ARD “Morgenmagazin” and called for “pragmatic solutions” – if one or another country wanted to keep them, that’s fine.
Markus Söder was one of them. In Bavaria, however, the accommodation ban only applies to non-residents; With vacationers from risky areas of Bavaria, it’s the official justification, you can handle it. Indeed, the regulatory mess that emerged after Corona’s latest round is causing Merkel great concern as well. On the one hand, explained someone close to them these days, it is understandable that countries with few cases want to prevent vacationers from importing the virus.
5,000 new people infected per day
On the other hand, the debate about the confusion of federal measures has almost suppressed the real danger. The numbers are increasing and they are doing it fast. In the morning, the Robert Koch Institute reported for the first time more than 5,000 newly infected people in one day. The number of risk areas within Germany is increasing daily; now even the Sauerlandidyll Olpe is one of them.
Merkel made infectologist Michael Meyer-Hermann speak at the beginning of the session. “It’s not five minutes to twelve, but twelve,” the Braunschweig expert warned. Using diagrams and curves, he illustrated how Germany would slide rapidly into loss of control with exponential growth in corona infections, as France, the Netherlands or the Czech Republic are already experiencing.
Participants report that the conference was quite impressive. But when the chief scientist put an exit ban into risk areas into play, he ran into opposition. Many were unwilling to take such brave steps. On the contrary: Laschet, Kretschmer, but also Tobias Hans (CDU) from Saarland, Malu Dreyer (SPD) from Rhineland-Palatinate and even Peter Tschentscher (SPD) from Hamburg, as a trained doctor, generally among the cautious, did not want the ban vacation. Follow.
The idea that travelers from hotspot regions can be tested for free has a fatal side effect, they argued: Testing capabilities would be urgently needed elsewhere as the number of cases increases. Even Merkel does not find the fact that the measure also costs more acceptance than to protect herself from infection. But every “XX” in Braun’s article was contested. Tighter mask requirements, curfew, alcohol ban, limits for private parties: from 50 new infections per week per 100,000 inhabitants, or even from 35 positive tests?
One in three people in North Rhine-Westphalia already lives in a region of 50, Bavaria is on the way there. With a limit of 35 access points, entire territorial states would soon be a corona alarm zone. But what is the alternative? “When it starts, it goes very fast,” Söder warned the group. Nobody wants the next confinement. But at night, when the meatballs were opened after more than five hours, Merkel’s question was still in the room: “Do we want to take a bold step?”
