After the test breakdown, Bavaria continues to compile the exact numbers under high pressure. On Saturday there was still no clarity in the notification of tested travel returnees. There is also no reason to give the all-clear nationwide.
Munich / Berlin (dpa) - The health authorities in Bavaria were not able to solve the problem of notifying holiday returnees who tested positive for the corona virus on Saturday.
The numbers, which, among other things, should provide information on how many of those who tested positive have now learned their results, should now be announced on Sunday afternoon, said a spokesman for the Ministry of Health in Munich on Saturday.
Originally, the state government had declared that everyone who tested positive should know their result by Thursday noon. This deadline passed, as did several others on Friday and Saturday. "Further details" have to be clarified, it said.
On Wednesday it became known that the results of 44,000 tests, most of which had been taken by holidaymakers at the mobile test centers at motorway service stations, had not yet reached those affected. This should include more than 900 positive tests. The news had triggered a political earthquake because those infected could infect thousands more people without knowing it. The government had attributed the problems to a lack of software and an unexpectedly large number of volunteers who took the tests. Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) had canceled a visit to the North Sea planned for Thursday and Friday.
The number of new infections reported in Germany remains high. According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the health authorities in Germany reported 1,415 new corona infections within one day by Saturday morning. As the RKI further announced, the number of circles without new infections is falling continuously. In the past 7 days, no cases were transmitted from 24 circles. In mid-July there were still 125 of the 400 or so districts and cities.
Foreign Minister Heiko Maas Maas warned against underestimating the situation. Everything must be done in Germany so that there is no second corona wave. "It is definitely too early for major events, for example. And: masks may be annoying, especially in the heat. But they help to slow down the spread of the virus and are still significantly better than more drastic restrictions," said the SPD. Politician of the "Passauer Neue Presse" (Saturday).
The breakdown in corona tests of travelers in Bavaria led to further infections, warned Maas, who also responded to statements by Prime Minister Söder. "I'm more worried than about Mr Söder's image about anyone who didn't know they were infected. The test mishaps in Bavaria made it possible for other people to be infected with corona," said Maas.
The President of the German Medical Association, Klaus Reinhardt, meanwhile spoke out in favor of Germany-wide test centers. "In order to avoid overburdening the resident doctors, the tests should be organized better and more uniformly," Reinhardt told the "Rheinische Post" (Saturday). Also with a view to the seasonal infections to be expected in autumn, the corona tests would have to be separated from the standard care.
Bavaria is already planning nationwide corona test centers shortly. Such centers are to be set up in every rural district and in every independent city, as the Bavarian cabinet decided last week. There are test centers all over Germany, including at airports and train stations.
As in Bavaria, there are delays in the transmission of the results of the corona tests in Rhineland-Palatinate - for example in Trier. It is difficult to publish all negative results promptly, said the head of the health department for Trier and Trier-Saarburg, Harald Michels, the German press agency. This is also due to the fact that everything is done with paper. All positive cases were informed immediately - "we are very close to the people," said Michels. "It's not the same here as in Bavaria. We just don't manage to publish the negative results promptly."
Brandenburg's Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke (SPD) meanwhile called on the states to work closely together on corona rules. "It was very effective for Germany that the federal states coordinated very closely with the federal government in March and April," said the incumbent President of the Federal Council. He criticized the fact that individual countries went forward with their own proposals, but did not mention any names. "The constant advance of some federal states does not help everyone, because it unsettles people and then the question arises, why are they doing something that the others are not doing.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 200815-99-181189 / 2
RKI management report