National Health Reserve: Learn from the pandemic in the pandemic

In the end, Jens Spahn had to defend his masks again.

"These are these masks," he said on Wednesday and held a white FFP2 copy in front of the blue wall of the federal press conference.

It has been a good month since the Federal Health Minister and CDU politician had to defend themselves against allegations that his house had bought masks that were possibly of inferior quality, at least not adequately tested.

Even more: he wanted to distribute these masks to socially disadvantaged people if the SPD-led Federal Ministry of Labor had not intervened.

Julia Löhr

Business correspondent in Berlin.

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Even then, Spahn had rejected the criticism.

Even on Wednesday, when he presented the “National Health Protection Reserve” in Berlin, he stuck to this line.

He uses the masks regularly, they have been checked and protected.

And yes, these masks are now also being stored “if the minister is not wearing them”.

"Being unprepared costs a lot more"

Masks, disposable gloves, gowns, certain medications: when the corona pandemic hit Germany last year, much of it was scarce in both hospitals and care facilities.

Products that had previously only cost a few cents and could be procured from countries like China at any time suddenly became goods that were as competitive as they were expensive.

At that time there was a “wild west situation” on the world market, said Spahn. Although it was possible to procure the appropriate products, Germany should not find itself in a situation like the one back then. For this reason, the federal government decided last year to both build up more stocks and accelerate domestic production. One wants to learn "in the pandemic from the pandemic", said Spahn.

Over a period of six months, the reserves should be sufficient to continue supplying the German health system with its own resources in the event of a crisis. The federal cabinet approved a corresponding concept from the federal ministries for health and the interior on Wednesday. We are talking about a billion surgical masks, more than 250 million FFP2 masks and an unquantified number of gloves, gowns and medication.

According to Spahn, the stocks are to be used "on a rolling basis", which means that when the expiry date of a certain batch is approaching, the manufacturer should bring it into circulation on the open market so that the products do not have to be disposed of. The reserves are to be replenished from new production at the same time. The reserve is intended for three scenarios: this and future pandemics, the disruption of global supply chains and acute emergency situations such as natural disasters and defense cases. Support from other countries should also be possible in this way.

"That costs, but to be unprepared costs a lot more," said Spahn. Even if the keeping of such stocks is worth a double-digit million amount year after year, this is still the cheaper way over the long term. “It is always more expensive to buy in an emergency.” There is no need for a law to build up the reserve. This is part of normal government work. Not part of the health reserve, but also in preparation is that Germany, together with other European countries, secure production capacities from vaccine manufacturers that can be activated in the event of a crisis. The federal government wants to pay the companies a kind of commitment fee for this. The corresponding contracts are to run for a period of five years. The vaccine reserve is intended to enableTo produce an additional 500 million doses annually, be it for booster vaccinations against the coronavirus or other pathogens.

Spahn: 200 is the new 50

With a view to the current infection rate, Spahn indicated that in view of the increasing vaccination rate, the limits of the seven-day incidence threatening to overload the health system are also shifting.

Three quarters of the over 65-year-olds are vaccinated, a quarter not.

From this, the Minister of Health, with a view to earlier limit values, derived the conclusion: “200 is the new 50.” At the same time, Spahn advised not to let the numbers come back to high in the first place.

If the development of the past few weeks continues, the 400 mark could be exceeded in September and the 800 mark in October, he warned.

The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) reported a seven-day incidence of 11.4 on Wednesday.

The value has more than doubled within twelve days.

In view of the rising corona numbers, the federal cabinet agreed on Wednesday to extend the existing rules for travel to Germany until September 10th. At the same time, the quarantine obligations are being relaxed somewhat. The change that has been adopted provides that in future it will be possible to shorten the fourteen-day quarantine if a virus variant area is downgraded to a high-incidence area while the returnees are in quarantine in Germany. So far, this has not been possible, which has caused displeasure, especially among returnees from Portugal.

In addition, fully vaccinated people who come from so-called virus variant areas can end their quarantine prematurely in the future if they can prove that their vaccination protection against the respective virus variant is effective. The information provided by the RKI is decisive for this. The previous entry regulation is only valid until July 28th.