Germany benefits from the fact that the corona vaccination campaign in the United States is stalling.
For example, President Joe Biden had announced that by the national holiday on July 4th, 70 percent of his compatriots should receive at least one injection against Covid-19.
But it doesn't look like that at the moment, as the willingness to vaccinate has fallen sharply.
Christian Geinitz
Business correspondent in Berlin
Follow I follow
Instead of an average of three million daily syringes as in April, only 1.2 million are currently used in the USA.
In states like Vermont or Massachusetts, where Biden was elected, the 70 percent is reached.
In Mississippi, Louisiana or Wyoming, the majority of whom voted for Donald Trump, the rate is not even 40 percent.
"There has never been such a magnitude"
Because the vaccine has a limited shelf life, it has to be administered.
As a result, America started exporting vaccines after long export restrictions.
Germany is a big beneficiary of fresh deliveries of the American Moderna vaccine.
The EU has secured 80 million cans of these twice.
The first contract was distributed to the member states according to the number of inhabitants, but only a few countries took part in the second and were able to secure correspondingly larger shares. While the first delivery agreement with Moderna preparations from Switzerland has not yet been concluded, follow-up orders are already coming straight from the USA to Europe, especially to Germany and Denmark. Only Croatia from Eastern Europe is there.
Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn (CDU) confirmed at the weekend that significantly more Moderna vaccine will soon be coming to the Federal Republic. In May there were still around 551,000 cans a week, in June 590,000. The forecast for July was 733,000, but Spahn has now almost doubled it to 1.33 million. Only BioNTech has more, namely 3.2 million. But Moderna is catching up. In August, the plan is to deliver almost 2.6 million units per week, and in September then almost 3 million. From the two overlapping Moderna contracts, Germany receives a total of 5.3 million vaccine doses in July, 10.3 million in August and then 14.5 million in September.
According to Spahn, other manufacturers will also deliver more in the coming week. AstraZeneca is expected to provide five million additional cans. Another million is planned from Johnson & Johnson, which, like Moderna, is based in America. The vaccination centers received almost five million doses from all providers in the first week of July, said Spahn. "There has never been such a magnitude."
Every adult willing to vaccinate will be able to receive an initial injection by the end of July: “If the deliveries continue like this, maybe a little earlier.” According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), around 853,000 vaccinations took place on Friday.
Almost 29 million people, 35 percent of the population, are now fully vaccinated.
44.45 million, or 53 percent, would have received at least one vaccine dose.
RKI boss Lothar Wieler said the willingness to vaccinate should not decrease.
80 percent of the population would have to be immunized.
Overtaken Great Britain for the first time
It was said that Germany overtook Great Britain for the first time in terms of the absolute number of first-time vaccinations, which however has 16 million fewer inhabitants.
According to the German Association of General Practitioners, no vaccination fatigue has been found among the patients.
But there are more rejections and cases where vaccination candidates did not show up.
Meanwhile, State Secretary for Economic Affairs Thomas Bareiß (CDU) encouraged the event industry to reopen in late autumn.
"If everyone has received a vaccination offer, there is no longer any reason why events with 10,000 visitors or more should not be possible again," he told the newspaper Welt am Sonntag.
Vaccination refusers might have to stay outside: "Anyone who claims the freedom not to be vaccinated or tested must also accept the entrepreneurial freedom of the organizer not to let him in," said Bareiß.