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Anne Will ends her 2020 talk show series with a thematic bang: On the last broadcast of the year, she discussed the currently decided national shutdown with her guests..
“Advent, Advent, turn on a little light …”: The pre-Christmas and festive atmosphere will have to spread differently among people this year. Although politicians wanted to make hopes for Christmas in a wider circle with the easy version of the closure in November. That was wrong? Has politics played trust with the federal and state government from one side to the other? Anne Will wanted to know that from her guests on her talk show.
The guests
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Manuela Schwesig (SPD), Prime Minister of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
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Kristina Dunz, Head of the Rheinische Post Parliamentary Office
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Armin Laschet (CDU), Prime Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia
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Julian Nida-Rümelin, philosopher and political scientist
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Uwe Janssens, President of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine
The positions
“We in intensive medicine say it is five past twelve,” was the urgent appeal of Dr. Janssens. “We need the numbers to go down.” A line will soon be crossed: “Then people who help other seriously ill people will no longer be there,” he said, referring to the high physical and psychological stress on doctors and nurses. If you’ve been waking up every morning for weeks to a new infection rate of around 20,000, it was predictable by mid-November that clinics would be full by Christmas, according to the doctor.
Laschet could not make such a concise statement. First she had to put up with Will’s question about whether she could keep up with her “own mess.” The moderator was referring to the fact that a few days ago the Prime Minister had advocated for a closure only after Christmas. According to the Prime Minister, that was Leopoldina’s scientific advice at the time. Whether the measures are now taken before the festival depends on the ad hoc increase in infections. The fastest possible time for departure is Wednesday. Schwesig jumped at him. State parliaments must have the opportunity to properly prepare the necessary processes. Laschet’s additional appeal to the population: “Everyone must participate.”
The date of the night
The date for the evening came from Dunz, who reported a very personal circumstance. Unaware that she was infected, she visited her family. When he found out after the infection, he fell into a hole. “In the end you have to live with the fact that you infected your mother, your grandmother,” he said. Everyone who is now thinking of visiting us at Christmas should be aware of this. “You don’t get over it.” He summarized how the family dealt with the issue: “It was very difficult for me. I got over it. We survived it.” But it will accompany you for a long time.
The number of the night
There was a brief confusion because Dunz extrapolated the number of people allowed for Christmas gatherings to more than 10. This would be the rulebook: Five people from a maximum of two households with four additional people and their partners. Children under 14 years old not included. Laschet and Schwesig couldn’t go on. It went so far that the union re-examined the regulations. The number is clear. The subordinate clause that led Dunz to calculate with his life partner was only intended to describe the group from which the four additional people may come, that is, the immediate family.
For Will, it only showed one thing, “which is incredibly complicated.” Wouldn’t it be easier then to let only those who live together celebrate Christmas together? He asked Laschet. “Yes,” replied the puzzled one. But that is not the reality of life in Germany. Janssens was sure: “It will be a difficult Christmas.” People just have to express love through distance.
The thrill of the night
The current round at Will was not designed to break up in an argument. Even the little things briefly warmed the mind. For example, when Will von Laschet and Schwesig wanted to know why the decision was made in mid-November to network health authorities with the SORMAS software from the Helmholtz Institute, even though it had been operational since early summer.
Schwesig’s somewhat snobby reply: “We haven’t locked any better software.” Or as Dunz emphasized that the protection of risk groups in nursing homes and nursing homes is not as transparent as one would like. Rapid antigen tests are not available in many places. FFP2 masks were also a long time coming.
The conclusion
Therefore, it is more a knowledge that remains of the night. Nida-Rümelin and Janssens in particular derived this from the discussion. What happens after January 10, the formally scheduled end of the shutdown? The philosopher turned out to be a tough analyst. After the first time, people “got carried away” and gave little thought to other strategies, for example for schools and health authorities. Your question: “Do we have a sustainable strategy in Germany and Europe?”
Janssens agreed with him. Society must be prepared for the fact that the first four months of 2021 will be just as difficult. Only with an incidence value of ten to thirty per 100,000 in seven days can we speak of normalization. Because then the health authorities could trace the chains of contagion again. So one could “see the sun rise” again in mid-2021.
Nida-Rümelin also advocated for a new tracking app to allow for more targeted tracking. Even if, as an advocate for data protection, you had to emphasize that this would have to be left behind. However, it is incomprehensible that no progress has been made on the issue of the Corona application due to the basic right to informal self-determination. On the other hand, the blockade would interfere with other fundamental rights in a much more massive way.
Fact checking
FDP leader Christian Lindner called for proportionality to be maintained in the course of the next anti-crown measures. What does that mean? The Basic Law grants all elementary rights of freedom. Freedom of religion, freedom of expression, protection of property, inviolability of one’s home. In addition, there is the general freedom of action in article 2, paragraph 1, or the general crime of human dignity in article 1.
The central issue when examining a fundamental right is the definition of the scope of protection. The State can only intervene in these protection areas with sovereign measures if there is legal legitimacy. The lawyers speak here of a barrier to a basic right. The Crown regulations of the federal states are part of this. But nothing without double protection: these barriers must also be measured against standards. That is proportionality. Because not all interventions that are effective are also helpful.
State intervention in a fundamental right must be adequate and necessary. Then there is “proportionality in the strictest sense”. Four words that determine a principle of decisive order in our legal system. It is about judicially weighing the things that speak of the restriction of the fundamental right or support the protection of the fundamental right to freedom.
