When Federal Finance Minister Olaf Scholz, SPD, sent a list of questions to Health Minister Jens Spahn of the CDU at the turn of the year, in which information about the corona vaccination campaign was required, the balance of power in the Union had not yet been sorted.

It was not clear who would become chairman, nor was the question about the candidate for chancellor answered.

Spahn couldn't be quite so sure who would defend him from his own ranks against the oncoming comrades.

Eckart Lohse

Head of the parliamentary editorial office in Berlin.

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    Markus Wehner

    Political correspondent in Berlin.

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      Now that the important decisions have been made in the Union, the Minister of Health can be sure that all important Union people, including the Chancellor, will stand behind him.

      It was the same this week when the SPD accused that Spahn had put protective masks into circulation in the early phase of the pandemic that did not meet the required safety standards.

      On Friday, the accusations, which the Ministry of Health had already repeatedly rejected, received new food through a report in the magazine Der Spiegel.

      Several federal states had checked the protective masks supplied by the federal government again for their safety and withdrew several million of them due to quality defects.

      It is quoted from a letter from Paritätische Pflege Schleswig-Holstein to Spahn.

      There was a corona outbreak there, five people died.

      According to the letter, it “cannot be ruled out” that “the use of your inadequate masks was partly responsible for the outbreak”.

      Why Baden-Württemberg checked a second time

      But the matter is complicated. A letter from the Ministry for Social Affairs and Integration of the State of Baden-Württemberg, which is led by the Green politician Manfred Lucha, shows how complicated it is. It was sent to the municipal umbrella organizations on February 5, 2021. It states that Baden-Württemberg had "randomly subjected the masks from China and other countries to a qualified laboratory test" in accordance with the "test specifications valid at the time of import". This showed that the masks met the requirements.

      For the masks that were procured by the federal government, one relied on its technical inspection.

      However, due to persistent doubts about the quality of masks, the Ministry of Social Affairs in Stuttgart decided in January to have “the entire stock range” of the masks procured by the federal and state governments checked again by DEKRA, an officially recognized testing and monitoring organization.

      At the time of writing, 27 mask types had been tested.

      Of these, 13 would have "not met the requirements of EN149".

      EN149 is the European standard for FFP mask types.

      The letter also lists the 13 incriminated masks according to manufacturer, model, date of manufacture and batch number. In the majority, a "permeability well above the normal value" is cited as a defect.

      It was not possible to determine how many masks were rejected

      Several masks from a specific batch, i.e. a production unit, are always tested.

      It is noticeable that the batch number of six masks tested was "unknown".

      In the case of a mask from the manufacturer "Uleok Tangshan Technology Co. Ltd.", not only was the batch number unknown, but also the model and date of manufacture.

      The ministry also announced that masks that were "regrettably" rejected by DEKRA were also given out to nursing homes and integration and homeless assistance facilities after the state government decided in December 2020 to give residents 90 respirators free of charge.

      For the ministry it is “unfortunately no longer conclusively ascertain whether and how many masks” that have now been objected to have “been distributed to the respective institution”.

      That is why it was decided to once again equip all the facilities supplied with “90 EU-compliant FFP2 masks” - “preferably from German production”.

      However, this means considerable logistical effort.

      The exchange and the subsequent delivery of FFP2 masks are still going on, the Ministry in Stuttgart announced on Friday at the request of the FAZ.

      Spahn wants to disclose test reports from the Ministry of Health

      Homes and institutions are also requested not to destroy cardboard boxes with masks - in order to be able to assert corresponding claims for damage against the supplier. Of the 17 types of mask complained about, 13 were procured by the federal government, while four were procured by the state, according to Stuttgart. The thesis that “inferior” masks were procured and distributed from the Spahn house alone can hardly be upheld.

      In Berlin on Friday in the hall of the federal press conference, despite the summer heat in the capital, the usual coolness prevailed around the seats of the speakers for the health ministry led by CDU man Spahn and the labor ministry led by the social democrat Heil. These are the two departments that are at the center of the dispute. The spokesman for the Ministry of Labor responded to the new reports that states had complained about the poor quality of the masks sent by the federal government by arguing that they had a “clearly different view” of which test standards should be applied to which masks.

      The Ministry of Health said that the countries had been offered an examination of the mask delivery if they thought they had cause for complaint. There have been complaints, but no check has shown that deliveries were defective. Spahn, it is said, has nothing against disclosing the test reports from the Ministry of Health. For reasons of competition, however, this may only be done in the Bundestag's secret protection office.