Where is the future Chancellor?

This is what has been asked in the last few weeks.

In times when the corona pandemic is taking the country back prisoner, Olaf Scholz is hiding, was the allegation.

Ongoing coalition negotiations, from which little emerges, are "no excuse for silence when there are pressing problems," said CSU General Secretary Markus Blume and expressly linked this with the corona situation.

At 9:40 a.m. on Thursday, the scolded man came to the desk of the Bundestag.

The advised on an amendment to the Infection Protection Act, with which the expiry of the "epidemic situation of national scope" is to be replaced.

Markus Wehner

Political correspondent in Berlin.

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The parliamentary groups of the future traffic light government have drawn up proposals for this.

Shortly before Scholz's appearance, the current high of more than 50,000 new infections became known, the incidence is now almost 250, the intensive care units are running full again.

The prerequisites for a blood and sweat speech in front of parliament and the country would have been good, Scholz could have described the dramatic development of the last few days and weeks.

"The virus is still among us"

But then he would probably not be Olaf Scholz. "The virus is still with us and threatens the health of the citizens," began the man who wants to be elected Chancellor in a good four weeks in the Bundestag, his speech. You have to be careful, stick to the wearing of masks and the rules of distance. Above all, however, it is about that even more people should be vaccinated. "We have to start a big joint campaign that citizens get vaccinated," said Scholz, a bit as if it were about a completely new topic.

Scholz then named a whole series of steps that should now be taken. The vaccination centers should be reopened and the booster vaccinations for millions of citizens should take place quickly. In the nursing homes in particular, it is now necessary to “boost everything”, and it must be checked precisely how far the homes are with it. Scholz spoke out in favor of 3G in the workplace and praised the fact that many federal states now wanted to introduce 2G. It is also important that there will be free tests again. In the coming week, apparently on Thursday, the federal government will meet with the prime ministers of the states for another conference on the corona situation, said Scholz. "The Chancellor and I agree on that". The SPD countries had previously slowed down when such a meeting was called for by the CDU and CSU.The country must now pull together, said Scholz and at the end of his speech appealed once again to the citizens to get vaccinated.