So now after all: What has been categorically excluded, the mandatory vaccination, will come in February at the latest.

The fact that Olaf Scholz and others from the traffic light coalition are already declaring the matter a question of conscience, i.e. not wanting to tie it to parliamentary group discipline, speaks for an exciting decision-making process in the ranks of the new government parliamentary groups.

Is Scholz already afraid of not being able to set up a majority?

The turnaround in the second pandemic winter also has to do with the fact that the point has been reached again at which Germany has to ask itself whether it still corresponds to the image it likes to have of itself: well-organized, straightforward, capable of learning. Instead, what the Germans experience is a single vaccination hullabaloo, in which standing in line in the cold is the least of the evils. A small minority, those unwilling to vaccinate, has the country under control, and the responsible politicians are well trained in serving minorities, but not in asserting the interests of the great majority and common sense. 

In almost two years, the federal government, states, municipalities and associations have also not been able to present a well thought-out vaccination strategy.

Even now the citizens are faced with a mixture of stubbornness, hastiness, improvisation, bottlenecks and service according to regulations.

Scholz could make up for his mistake

Last spring, this could be explained by teething problems.

The carelessness in the summer of declaring the vaccination centers obsolete and the compulsory vaccination superfluous could be graciously overlooked if at the same time an emergency plan for all cases had matured in the drawer.

But now one again points to the other, and to make matters worse, what has definitely been ruled out, namely that there could be too few vaccination offers for too great a demand, occurs again.

This is not only the case because a still poor network of vaccination centers is overloaded, but also because there is apparently a lack of supplies and logistics.

And that at the very moment when the willingness to vaccinate is finally as high as desired.

That is unprofessional, desperate, yes tragic.

The new crisis team in the Chancellery will hopefully cope better with this than the crisis team that the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Health set up years ago.

Olaf Scholz could make up for the mistake his coalition made in the Infection Protection Act.

The compulsory vaccination will help to prepare for the vaccination campaign in a more general manner.

Maybe one day it will still be possible to send every citizen of this country a binding vaccination appointment by post.

Gladly on paper.

The stamp should read: The state is there for the sake of people, not people for the sake of the state.