In view of the continued high number of infections and great concern about the coronavirus mutations that have emerged, the discussion about tightening the lockdown in the near future has really picked up speed. The federal and state governments are therefore bringing their deliberations forward to next week.

Next Tuesday to 14. 00 a conference of Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) and the Prime Minister of the federal states is planned, as government spokesman Steffen Seibert said on Friday. Originally, the next federal-state switch to measures against the corona pandemic was for the 25. January.

Parliamentary deliberations The Greens group has requested a special meeting of the Health and Economic Committee for next week. “In view of the dramatic situation, the Bundestag cannot wait until the next regular week of session,” said parliamentary group leader Katrin Göring-Eckardt the Spiegel . “As long as the number of infections does not go down, the lockdown measures cannot be ended, and further measures will be necessary, especially in the world of work,” emphasized the Green politician. “We should ask ourselves whether, in the end, a complete lockdown of two to three weeks is better than an endless hanging game,” said Thorsten Frei, deputy chairman of the Union parliamentary group in the Bundestag.

Merkel did that Consultation needs on Thursday evening in meetings to prepare for the election party convention of the CDU according to information from dpa from several participants. The CDU party congress will take place on Friday and Saturday and should finally elect a new CDU chairman; Choices are Armin Laschet, Norbert Röttgen and Friedrich Merz.

There is currently no scope for openings, Merkel emphasized. Saxony’s Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer (CDU) said on Thursday evening in the ZDF broadcast Maybrit Illner : “Completely shut down kindergartens, close schools, really entry bans in the nursing homes if there is no negative rapid test – we need to discuss things like that. ”

Mutation spreads The The variant of the coronavirus that has emerged in the UK is spreading much faster than the original form, scientists are very worried. Everyone believes that the virus mutation is very aggressive and that its spread must be slowed down. Act now. Merkel was quoted as saying that one was in a race against time and could not go until 25. Wait January.

Saxony’s head of government said something very similar on ZDF. The number of infections has not decreased as a result of the current lockdown “as we wanted it and as we need it”. At this point, Kretschmer also referred to the possibly more contagious virus mutations that could further increase the number of infections.

Problem with public transport? In Kretschmer’s view, it is also important to take a look at local public transport. “The public transport, not so many people are allowed to ride. From my point of view, that is now the order of the day.” According to several participants, Merkel rejected a report in the “Bild” newspaper on Thursday evening at the CDU deliberations, according to which the Chancellery was thinking about the suspension of local and long-distance public transport.

Also The President of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), Lothar Wieler, once again made it clear that, in his opinion, the measures taken to date in the fight against the coronavirus are insufficient. In the ARD “Tagesthemen” he also appealed to implement the current measures more consistently.

“We need more test sites that can detect the mutation,” demanded Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) in the meantime the newspapers of the Funke media group. “In addition, FFP2 masks and a consistent implementation of the current lockdown help,” emphasized Söder, whose government has introduced an FFP2 mask requirement for Bavaria in local public transport and retail from Monday. Söder did not want to predict whether a hard lockdown would be necessary by Easter. But: “I also stay on the team, be careful.”

Race The SPD health expert Karl Lauterbach spoke at “maybrit illner” of a race to get the current wave under control quickly enough before the new virus mutations spread more widely. If that doesn’t work, “we won’t get out of lockdown anytime soon”. This will not succeed without tightening. Lauterbach explained that the average age in the large intensive care units is currently 60 years. Among them are many younger people, with obesity becoming an increasingly strong risk factor for the most severe courses.

The age in the intensive care units has decreased because there are many older people Die meanwhile in the nursing homes, said Lauterbach. “If, as in the first wave, we were to bring all the people from the care facilities to the intensive care units, then the intensive care unit would have long been overrun,” he said. Even with the best intensive care in the modern intensive care units, the sick nursing home residents died there. Accepting her there is no longer attempted today. Rather, one is now fighting over the large group of baby boomers with risk factors. “And we won’t last long.” Those are very difficult cases.

Intensive care units at the border The President of the German Interdisciplinary Association for intensive care and emergency medicine (Divi), Gernot Marx, brought a possible target mark of less than 1000 Covid in the newspapers of the Funke media group – 19 – Intensive care patients as a condition for easing into play. “Spoken in traffic light colors: In 11 from 16 federal states, the traffic light is red, there is less than 15 Percent free intensive care beds, “said Marx. Any easing is unlikely to come until the situation has eased significantly. “The number of intensive care Covid – 16 – patients must be well below 1000 Patients are lying. ” Currently, almost 5200 Covid – 19 – Patients treated in intensive care all over Germany.

In Germany, over two million people have been infected with the virus since the outbreak of the corona pandemic. The health authorities reported to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) 22. 368 new corona infections within 24 hours , as the RKI announced on Friday morning. This increased the number of cases that have become known since the beginning of the pandemic to 2. 000 .958 (Was standing: 15. 01., 00. 00 Clock). It should be noted that the actual total number is likely to be significantly higher, since many infections are not recognized. In addition, 1113 new deaths were reported within 24 hours recorded. The previous high of 1244 new deaths was reached on Thursday.

(jk)