ROSTOCK, Germany – It was almost noon, but Steffen Bockhahn’s phone kept ringing with people wanting to know if they were eligible for vaccination, and if not now, when?
Days earlier, Germany had changed its orientation about who qualified for vaccines, resulting in an apparently endless stream of questions from concerned local residents to Bockhahn, the health minister of this port city in northeastern Germany.
“No, I’m sorry, but we are still not allowed to vaccinate anyone in Category 2, only nurses or other caregivers who are in the first priority group,” he told an interlocutor. “You have to wait.”
More than two months after the country’s second complete blockade, people across Germany are getting tired of waiting, whether for vaccines, getting their government compensation or returning to normalcy. For Germans, it is a discouraging downfall.
At the beginning of the pandemic, Germany showed itself to be a global leader in dealing with a public health crisis that occurs once every century. Chancellor Angela Merkel formed a consensus on a blockade. His government’s testing and tracking tools have made European neighbors jealous. The country’s mortality and infection rates are among the lowest in the European Union. His health care was stellar. And a generally reliable population obeyed restrictions with relatively low grumblings.
No longer. In the second wave of the virus, Germany is now inundated like everyone else. A series of tougher new restrictions extended, amid loud complaints and even occasional protests before everything was closed again. Still, infection rates are around 10,000 new cases per day.
As elsewhere, fears of new variants first identified in England and South Africa are overturning the most elaborate plans. Germany’s vaccination program, tied to the fate of the European Union, has failed. Only 3.5% of Germans received their first vaccines and about 2% were fully immunized.
For a country that used to be number 1 in Europe – in economic power, with a reputation for efficiency and organization – the turnaround was not welcome.
“For a long time the country has enjoyed the brilliance of its initial success,” said the Süddeutsche Zeitung in an editorial. “Now the coronavirus has revealed that Germany has dramatic deficits; in its governance, in its administration and with its politicians. “
A survey by the Pew Research Center showed that, while more Germans feel confident in the way their country is dealing with the pandemic than Americans or British people, its approval fell by 11 percentage points between June and December 2020.
The climate only got worse while the Germans watched other countries, especially Britain, intensify their vaccination campaigns with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine – developed with the help of German taxpayers – while waiting for the doses to arrive.
Much of the delay stems from the scarcity of production and Germany’s decision to allow The European Union must negotiate vaccines on its behalf, as it did for all 27 bloc member states. But this solidarity has effectively penalized larger and richer countries, such as Germany. Since then, leaders in Brussels have admitted to making mistakes in their joint negotiations, but this has done little to appease the Germans who are still waiting for vaccines.
Merkel’s government helped BioNTech refurbish a production facility that opened this month, hoping to lighten the load on a Pfizer plant in Belgium that has struggled to fulfill its orders. But it will take weeks, if not months, before the increase in supply reaches vaccination centers.
The Rostock center opened in late December, but on many days, only the team is present because there are no doses to administer. In the days when vaccines arrive, there are usually so few available that the team of retired doctors, German Army soldiers and local volunteers outnumber the people who arrive to get the vaccines.
“We have a great team here, there is a lot of team spirit. They want to vaccinate, vaccinate, vaccinate, ”said Bockhahn. “But when you can handle 1,000 a day and you’re only reaching 400 this week, it’s frustrating. It is quite clear. “
Vaccines are just a point of frustration. Mayors are warning of the death of towns in the interior if small shops cannot reopen. Some states have reopened schools, while others remain closed. Doctors are warning of the lasting psychological damage that the blockade is causing to children.
Parents are also frustrated by the lack of support for online learning. Germany’s strict data protection laws prevent Germans from using U.S.-based digital learning platforms, but local solutions don’t always work perfectly. In many public schools, education now consists of teachers sending classes as email attachments for students to work on their own.
Small and independent business owners are struggling to understand the rules that determine whether they are allowed to work and, if not, whether they are entitled to compensation. Many of them are struggling to stay afloat, while others have given up. Small businesses were more affected than the industrial sector, as the German economy contracted 5% last year.
Ms. Merkel did her best to stimulate a tired audience. Last month, the chancellor normally reserved he appeared before the Berlin news corps, gave two prime-time television interviews and chatted by video with families overwhelmed by caring for children at home. Each time, she offered guarantees, whether to parents exhausted from juggling school at home and their jobs, or hairdressers eager to get back to work.
“I wish I had something good to announce,” she said, addressing the nation.
The Germans too. With the country preparing for a general election in September – Merkel said she will not run again – and votes in several states in the coming months, the will to line up behind the goofy chancellor is weakening, as politicians begin to dispute a position before the end of his more than 15 years in power.
“Since the last block, I have reduced all possible overheads,” said Helmuth Fromberger, who runs a small photographic studio in the Bavarian city of Mühldorf. “But I got to the point where I can’t cut anymore.”
Normally, at this time of year, he would be busy taking portraits and planning weddings in spring and summer. This year, he can only take passport photos, which makes about $ 70 a day. But because it can remain open, it does not qualify for benefits designed by the government to help companies offset losses.
“I don’t really want government alms,” he said in a telephone interview. “But when they stop me from working, they have to take responsibility for it.”
In the past few weeks, dozens of hair salons across the country have come together to file lawsuits against their forced closings in each of the country’s 16 states. The combined effort is partially credited with the decision by Merkel and the governors to allow the salons to reopen in early March, as long as the number of new infections does not explode.
André Amberg, who runs a hair salon in the central city of Gotha, has filed a lawsuit against the government in his home state of Thuringia. He was forced to close his doors in mid-December and file for unemployment.
“What is most frustrating for me is that I am no longer able to decide for myself about my own life and work situation,” he said. “I am totally at the mercy of the government.”
Therefore, the Germans wait. Expect your leaders to come up with solutions. Wait for the number of infections to decrease. Wait to be vaccinated.
Dr. Reinhard Treptow, one of dozens of retired doctors who offered to administer vaccines in Rostock, spent more time waiting for doses to arrive than administering vaccines to people.
“We could be doing a lot more,” he said, pointing to the booths – now empty – where doctors administer injections at the center. “What we need is more doses”.
Asked if he thought Germany would have been wiser to acquire vaccines regardless of its European Union partners, he hesitated, then noted that his daughter, who lives in South Carolina, had already received the first dose.
“Let’s just say it didn’t work well here,” he said.