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secondChancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) has spoken out in favor of a tougher blockade in the fight against the corona pandemic. He advocated in the Bundestag on Wednesday for extended closures after Christmas. In a phase until January 10, stores should be closed, Merkel said in the budget debate in parliament. Holidays should also be extended or switched to digital lessons. Therefore, he expressly joined the demands of the Leopoldina Academy of Sciences for a total blockade at the national level. In your opinion, the recommendations are correct. “We have to make another effort,” said the chancellor.
Merkel also appealed to the population before Christmas, “to be very careful.” “If we have too many contacts now before Christmas and then it was the last Christmas with the grandparents, then we will have missed something, we should not do that,” said the Chancellor. It is “a bit inhuman” to distance oneself from other people, but that is not something that “totally destroys our lives”.
Merkel went on to say, “As difficult as it is, and I know how much love is behind it: when you set up mulled wine stands, when you set up waffle bakeries, it doesn’t go well with the agreement that, for example, we only eat and eat to go. to home”. They have agreed. I’m sorry, I really feel it in my heart, but if we pay the price of the death of (…) 590 people a day, that is not acceptable from my point of view. “
Merkel: “Otherwise, the pandemic will escape us again and again”
The goal must continue to be to reach 50 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants in seven days. “Otherwise, the pandemic will escape us again and again.” Contact restrictions in place since November could have halted exponential growth, but a trend reversal was unsuccessful. “The number of contacts is too high, the reduction of contacts is not enough,” said the Chancellor.
In her own words, Merkel is convinced that the vast majority of the population will continue to comply with the rules to contain the corona pandemic. “The vast majority of the population has shown that it is willing to be considerate, to put aside its own interests, to accompany them.” She is convinced that the majority are also willing to continue because it is recognized “that we are here with an extraordinary situation to be confronted.”
Merkel defended the federal government budget, which was also financed with high new debts. “We are living in a pandemic. We live in an exceptional situation, ”he said. “And we have to do something to make sure we act in a special way in this particular situation, and this is what this budget expresses.” Germany is a democratic country, economically strong, with social cohesion and a strong civil society. “This strength, that is what guides us in this budget, we want to maintain it even in this exceptional situation,” Merkel said.
The decision to assume debts of this magnitude was “anything but easy”, admitted the chancellor. It means a burden on future households and restrictions on future spending and future generations.
Merkel: “Global system competition” in the fight against the crown
The government had to make “difficult and painful decisions” in the pandemic, Merkel said. It’s not just about maintaining Germany’s strength financially. Rather, there is also “global system competition” in the fight against pandemics. Thus, the question will arise as to how Germany has weathered the months of the pandemic compared to other countries. As a liberal democracy, Germany acts differently from countries “that look more like a dictatorship,” Merkel said. He also emphasized that in Germany, bans are not the key to success, it is rather “the responsible behavior of each individual and the willingness to participate.”
In his speech in the Bundestag, FDP leader Christian Lindner called for more predictability in government action against the crown pandemic. The “half-life” of statements and recommendations is getting shorter, Lindner said in the general debate on the federal budget. A long-lasting and well-founded strategy based on scientific knowledge is still lacking. What is needed are not general and comprehensive measures, but predictable and regional measures.
Lindner asks questions about “constant correction of correction”
Lindner noted that federal Health Minister Jens Spahn (CDU) had refused to close retail stores again in September, as is now required. “Continuous correction of correction” raises questions about the scientific evidence for the measures.
The leader of the AfD parliamentary group, Alice Weidel, had previously criticized the previous crown restrictions: “Even after nine months, you are still rummaging through the fog and clinging to the improper blockade of the wooden hammer method, which causes more damage. collateral of which is useful in the fight against the corona virus, “said Weidel.
At the start of the budget week, Federal Finance Minister Olaf Scholz (SPD) defended the budget with new debt of 180 billion euros as a result of the Crown crisis on Tuesday. The opposition voiced clear criticism.
The draft budget of the Federal Ministry of Finance provides for expenditures totaling 498.6 billion euros. Due to the high costs of dealing with the corona pandemic, the debt brake anchored in the Basic Law will be lifted a second time. The final vote is scheduled for Friday.
Amid discussions of a tougher lockdown, Germany has a new record number of deaths per crown. The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) reported 590 deaths in 24 hours on Wednesday. In purely mathematical terms, a person in Germany dies from or with the virus approximately every two and a half minutes.
The previous record was a week ago with 487 kills per crown in one day. The number of infections increased by 20,815 to more than 1,218 million. The seven-day incidence increased from 1.9 to 149.1 per 100,000 population. The federal and state governments are struggling to bring the value back below the 50 threshold.
