[ad_1]
Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn calls for the national shutdown to continue after January 10. “In view of the still too high numbers, it is necessary to extend the measures, the restrictions,” said the CDU politician on the “RTL Aktuell” program.
To justify this, he also referred to a maximum number of Covid 19 patients in intensive care units. According to the German Hospital Association, 5,726 people are currently in intensive care; during the first wave of the pandemic in April it was around 2,900.
The prime ministers of the federal states will discuss next steps with Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) on Tuesday. It should reduce the infection rate and keep it low for a longer period of time, Spahn said. That’s better than relaxing too soon “and then possibly facing tough questions again in a few weeks.”
Spahn wants to keep schools closed
According to the health minister, schools and nurseries should also remain closed. That’s difficult for students and parents, but: “It’s easier for everyone to have schools closed for another week than to open them and then face debates again sometime in a few weeks.”
At the same time, Spahn ensured that all nursing home residents could get vaccinated during the month. “We can achieve that goal in January. And that is what we want and will achieve with the federal states. “
He again rejected criticism of the government’s vaccination strategy. “It goes exactly as planned,” he said. By the end of the year, 1.3 million doses of vaccine had been delivered to the federal states. Exactly the quantities that had been announced for weeks would be delivered, “with the indication that at first it would be scarce and that therefore it is necessary to prioritize”.
In view of the slow start of corona vaccination, critical voices against the federal government and the EU had increased. In the SPIEGEL conversation, for example, Biontech boss Uğur Şahin criticized the European ordering strategy. “Many other companies were supposed to come with vaccines. Obviously, the impression prevailed: we’ll get enough, it won’t be that bad and we’ve got it under control. “
“Serious failure” or “general good”?
The neurologist Frauke Zipp of the Leopoldina National Academy of Sciences even spoke in the newspaper “Die Welt” of a “flagrant failure of those responsible”. She asked why they hadn’t ordered more vaccines at risk in the summer.
The vaccination works “generally well”, however, it was well prepared in the care facilities and vaccination centers, Spahn said. “There is no question that it would be better to have more vaccines, and that is exactly what we are trying to do.” The federal government is talking with the manufacturer Biontech and the state of Hesse about how to create an additional production plant in Marburg from February. .
Biontech had taken over a Novartis plant for the production of vaccines there. In an interview with SPIEGEL, Şahin said: “Our new production plant in Marburg may be ready in February, much earlier than planned, and will be able to produce up to 250 million cans in the first half of the year.”
