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Health Minister Spahn: "We recognized many things too late and started too late"
Photo: Political-Moments / imago images
In view of the increasingly relaxed pandemic situation in Germany, Health Minister Jens Spahn (CDU) spoke in retrospect about the previous fight against the corona virus.
In an interview with NDR Info, Spahn also exercised gentle self-criticism.
When asked what the biggest mistake in the pandemic had been so far, Spahn replied: "In retrospect, I would have started earlier, we could and should have started earlier to buy protective equipment," said the Minister of Health. "We recognized a lot of things too late." However, the "real mistake" was a few years ago. Spahn referred to a report to the Bundestag from 2012 in which pandemic scenarios were described. "This report has been read, but it has not been lived," complained Spahn. "We could have known what could happen to us."
Spahn had recently come under massive criticism because his ministry's mask procurement was chaotic. The Federal Audit Office, for example, reprimanded a large order from the logistics group Fiege, which resides in a neighboring constituency of Spahn. Fiege had not only received the order to transport and store masks for the federal government, but was also allowed to deliver 350 million half masks and 700 million surgical masks for around one billion euros to the ministry via a framework contract. According to the Federal Audit Office, the amount was far too high.
The financial controllers had previously complained that the Ministry of Health had procured a billion items in Germany with a quantity of one billion "thirteen times the minimum requirement" and "eight times the quantities delivered to the federal states and associations of statutory health insurance physicians to date".
Spahn had his
"Unconventional action" later defended and referred to the special situation.
The Federal Audit Office had also credited him with the exceptional situation.
In addition, Spahn had recently had a heated exchange of blows with the Ministry of Labor under SPD Minister Hubertus Heil. The dispute was about the fact that Spahn's ministry wanted to distribute inferior and insufficiently tested masks to the homeless and people with disabilities. Later, the unusable masks from China, which had been procured millions of times, were supposed to disappear as unnoticed as possible.
However, Spahn did not address the scandals in the procurement of masks in the NDR interview.
When asked whether federalism is slowing down the pandemic, Spahn said the system could well lead to delays because "some of the people are acting out of their own political interests."
However, the minister also expressed himself positively with regard to the regional decision-making power of the 16 state health authorities and the more than 400 health authorities connected to them.
"That definitely gives strength," said Spahn.
The federal government could not do things from Berlin alone.
"Pictures full of stadiums feel wrong"
For the further course of the pandemic, Spahn urged caution. There are currently very few infections, but the delta variant of the coronavirus is likely to become the dominant form in Germany as well. "If we manage to keep the numbers low overall, we will also keep the Delta variant under control," says Spahn.
He criticized the high capacity utilization of the Wembley stadium in the England-Germany match.
"I think pictures full of stadiums feel wrong," said the Minister of Health.
It is right to reopen the stadiums to a reduced extent and with clear rules, as was recently done in Munich.
However, the 45,000 people who are supposed to watch the game on Tuesday evening in London are too many.
It is difficult to promote adherence to rules "when the opposite flickers on the screen every evening."
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