What will Scholz do against the fourth wave of Covid in Germany
Scholz will have a competent health minister to try to reverse the contagion curve. All the details in the in-depth analysis by Pierluigi Mennitti
With a general wizard of logistics, modeled on Figliuolo, and a competent Minister of Health and for months at the forefront of media communication on the pandemic, Olaf Scholz tries to reverse the curve of the fourth wave of Covid. It is the first emergency that will test the new government, officially in the saddle since Wednesday 8 December. All the rest of the ambitious program will come later, now Germany must put a patch on what has not been done by the outgoing executive in recent months: blocking infections, avoiding the collapse of intensive care units and giving back to the country – world economic and entrepreneurial included – the feeling of having regained control of the situation.
The decision to redesign the emergency committee and put it directly under the chancellery had already taken place in recent days. As well as the decision to entrust the leadership to a general of the Bundeswehr, Carsten Breuer, tracing the Italian experience today viewed with respect and envy here in Berlin. Breuer is the logistician and his abilities rest the hopes of resetting the supply chain and distribution of vaccine doses, after the mid-autumn disaster combined by Jens Spahn, the outgoing minister.
In addition to the relatively low immunization rate (just under 70% of the population, with minimal peaks in the eastern regions and in Bavaria, where today the incidence of infections is higher), there is also a slow progression in the administration of the booster, with bottlenecks and funnels here and there in the country, complicated by the federalist fragmentation of responsibilities and tasks.
Since yesterday, the last doubt that accompanied Scholz's restart plan, that of the political leadership of the emergency, has also been resolved. And the name chosen is that of Karl Lauterbach, a doctor and parliamentarian since 2005, an expert in health care and health economics of the SPD. For the readers of startmag.it , his name is nothing new, since he has recurred many times in the news from Germany on the pandemic: he was probably the politician most present on the German media, both traditional (press and TV) and on new social media , illustrating, explaining, foreseeing, sometimes prophesying, always polarizing opinions and judgments. For example, he will not need to get used to the escort as a minister, since he has been forced to go around with a couple of bodyguards for some time after the death threats received by the no-vax, from which he is very hated. From his: the competence and the fact that he almost never made a mistake in a forecast on the progress of the pandemic.
The choice to throw himself in the middle of the media battle has raised perplexity to the last, about his ability to recover the detachment and serenity necessary to face the Covid crisis not from a computer keyboard or from a talkshow studio, but from the desk. of minister. In the end, it was Scholz himself who dissolved the doubt and took the risk of a strong choice. Lauterbach has the skills, now he will have to demonstrate that he knows how to translate them into a politics of concrete facts. And in fact, Germany needs it as soon as possible.
The economy begins to suffer from the wrong approach to the fourth wave and the restrictive measures just reintroduced hit the tertiary sector again: with the introduction of 2G and 2Gplus (a sort of reinforced green pass), the presence in commercial stores is limited precisely in the weeks of Christmas shopping, as has been the case for a long time for restaurants, bars, hotels. For the president of the Ifo Clemens Fuest, this will not drag Germany into recession and at the end of the year the GDP will still register a growth of 2.5%, but certainly the recovery has slowed down and will be lower than what had been hoped for. in summer. However, current restrictions are inevitable and better than a complete lockdown, the economist concluded.
And to stay at the Ministry of Health, the Covid crisis will not be Lauterbach's only problem. As WirtschaftsWoche recalls, the pandemic has uncovered enormous financial problems in the German health system that will make the minister's job very difficult: "After years of lavish spending under CDU's predecessor Jens Spahn, who used the good economic situation for new services , and after the unexpected billionaire costs for Covid, Lauterbach will have to face shortcomings and identify saving strategies ".
According to the economic weekly, five construction sites await the minister: digitization, nursing and assistance (already today the lack of staff is one of the reasons for the reduction of intensive care), financial problems, contributions for the medical funds, redesign of the health care system. treatments with acceleration of prevention policies, winning in the long run but more expensive in the short term.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/olaf-scholz-germania-quarta-ondata/ on Tue, 07 Dec 2021 07:32:34 +0000.