The department heads were a long time coming, although they had been in such a hurry before.

The press conference with Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) and Justice Minister Marco Buschmann (FDP) on the changes to the Infection Protection Act began half an hour late on Wednesday afternoon.

The federal cabinet had previously waved the bill through by circulation.

The government had been much less generous the previous night with the time budget of the professional associations, whose opinion on the "formulation help for a draft law to amend the Infection Protection Act and other regulations" they had requested.

Christian Geinitz

Business correspondent in Berlin

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At 1.08 a.m., a corresponding e-mail was sent from Lauterbach’s house to the most important players in the healthcare system, including the health insurance companies, the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians, the German Medical Association and the hospital company.

It said that the technical comments on the twenty-four-page jungle of paragraphs were desired "by Wednesday, March 9, 2022, 10 a.m.", i.e. within less than nine hours.

The "extremely short deadline" for which the ministry apologized was due to the late intergovernmental agreement.

The decisive version of the draft, which is available to the FAZ, only came about at 11:30 p.m.

It has long been clear that the Corona rules will expire at the beginning of spring on March 20 and that the subsequent regulations will have to be passed in the Bundestag in the coming week.

In any case, the desired "association participation" was completely in vain before the decision was made in the federal cabinet.

The government round began its meeting on Wednesday exactly at the end of the deadline at 10 a.m., so it could not take the statements into account at all.

Is the Federal Ministry of Health overwhelmed?

A draft from Monday for the Covid 19 protective measures exception ordinance and the coronavirus entry ordinance also fits into the picture of erratic corona legislation.

According to the Ministry of Health (BMG), the associations should comment on this within two days, with Tuesday being a public holiday in Berlin.

In addition, the subject line was “URGUE!

Deadline 7.1.”, i.e. a long-elapsed date.

In terms of content, the new ordinance refers to changes in the Infection Protection Act that were not yet available at the time, i.e. could not be evaluated by the associations.

"You couldn't show more clearly that the BMG is overwhelmed," says a representative of the association, "and that they don't give a damn about the participation of the professional associations."

In the case of the Infection Protection Act, the different positions of the SPD and FDP are additional braking factors.

While the liberals want as few corona restrictions as possible and want to leave large parts of the protection efforts to individual discretion, Lauterbach urges caution and warns against misunderstanding March 20th as "Freedom Day".

At the press conference on Wednesday, he repeated that, unlike in Great Britain, more than ten percent of those over 60 are still unvaccinated and therefore particularly vulnerable.

Another line of conflict is the position of the federal states and the parliaments.

Lauterbach pointed out that the recommendations of the Prime Ministers' Conference had been followed, but that the Infection Protection Act did not require the approval of the Bundesrat.

Buschmann added that federal competence gives the federal states tools, but they cannot “invent” their own measures.

Since the state parliaments take over the design of the law to be passed by the Bundestag, parliamentary participation in the fight against the pandemic has been strengthened.

"In this way we have created clear, constitutional and democratically clean regulations thanks to strong parliamentary involvement," he said.

Both ministers called the new law a good compromise.

The traffic light is able to act even in difficult situations.

The new provisions are divided into so-called basic protective measures and special regulations for "hotspots", i.e. for particularly endangered places.

Basic security means that the federal states may continue to make masks and tests compulsory in homes, in outpatient care, in clinics and in outpatient care centers.

At the suggestion of the Greens, dialysis centers and oncological practices will probably also be involved.

Such requirements can also remain in force in buses and trains as well as in schools.

Stricter regional hotspot regulations come into effect when there is a particularly high rate of infection in a particular region, when a new virus variant appears or when the health care system is at risk of being overwhelmed.

Then the countries can issue a mask requirement, distance requirements, hygiene concepts and mandatory vaccination, convalescence or test certificates, i.e. access rules.

For Buschmann, the dichotomy means: In non-hotspot areas, “we are largely returning to the normality of life”.

The draft law will go to the parliamentary groups this Thursday, and the Bundestag is to adopt it on Friday next week.

The countries then have until April 2 to adjust to this, as long as the current rules continue to apply.

The new regulations run until September 23, because they may have to be tightened up at the beginning of autumn.

The aim of the changes is that the countries can react quickly and in a targeted manner.

Most recently, the Federal Government's Expert Council had also called for "short reaction times for government measures".