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Christian Drosten: "We didn't do anything particularly well"
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xim.gs / imago images
The Berlin virologist Christian Drosten sees Germany not yet adequately prepared for the coming period in the corona pandemic.
"In order to master the situation in the coming months, we have to change things," he said in advance of the World Health Summit in Berlin in October.
"The pandemic will only really start now. Here too."
He stressed that the pandemic is not a scientific phenomenon, but a natural disaster.
Pragmatic decisions are necessary, said Drosten according to the World Health Summit.
"There are already festive speeches about the German success, but it is not quite clear where it came from."
It simply goes back to the fact that Germany reacted around four weeks earlier than other countries.
"We reacted with exactly the same means as others. We didn't do anything particularly well. We just did it earlier," explained the head of the Institute for Virology at the Charité.
"Have to stop talking about football stadiums"
"We were not successful because our health authorities were better than the French, or because our hospitals are better equipped than the Italian," Drosten continued.
"If you carry that over to autumn, then of course you have to realize that we will not continue to do anything better than others."
Germany has to take a much more differentiated and closer look at developments abroad.
"We have to stop talking about things like football stadiums. It really is completely misleading."
An important lesson from the pandemic for the future is that health is the most important thing for the individual and the basis for a functioning society, said Detlev Ganten, President and founder of the World Health Summit, at the double interview.
"Economy, culture and all of that no longer work when what we see as guaranteed is no longer there. I'm not sure that everyone is really that clear."
It must also be clear that the approval of a vaccine does not immediately mean the solution to the problem, said Drosten.
First of all, the priority must be with risk groups.
"In addition to the expected distribution competence, it is also not that easy to fill so many vaccine doses into bottles and then to inoculate them," he explained.
"That's why this is an undertaking for the whole of 2021."
The virologist also appeals to science not to neglect important topics.
Medical research in this country is very cancer-oriented.
"Infectious diseases are extremely important in medicine, and we are not only noticing this now," said Drosten.
"We need a lot more research there."
Antibiotic resistance is the next big issue: "We see how it takes revenge if you neglect fields of activity that don't seem to affect us. But really only apparently."
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he / dpa
