The federal and state governments are debating a possible exit ban from corona hotspots. The Chancellor is in favor of it. However, in some countries this approach is considered to be unrealistic.
Chancellor’s Angela Merkel (CDU) endorsed exit restrictions for regions with an acute corona outbreak meet with resistance in the countries. Saxony-Stop prime minister Reiner Haseloff (CDU) announced “urgent need for discussion” on Wednesday and warned: “Fundamental rights cannot be restricted arbitrarily.” The state governments of Saxony, Lower Saxony, Thuringia and Berlin expressed doubts about the feasibility. The federal and state governments want to continue their talks on Thursday, as the news agency AFP learned from government circles.
The debate is about the question of how to deal with localized corona outbreaks – the Gütersloh district recently had such an outbreak. Chancellor Merkel spoke out on Tuesday to temporarily ban residents of affected areas from leaving the country so that they would not spread the virus to the rest of the country.
Positions are far apart
However, such a measure requires the approval of the federal states. On Monday had Chancellery Ministers Helge Braun (CDU) and advise the heads of the state chancelleries of the 16 federal states on a corresponding template from the chancellery. The positions were still far apart on Wednesday. On Thursday, Braun and the heads of state chancellors want to join together again for consultations, reports from negotiating circles. It was open whether an agreement could then be expected.
Saxony-Anhalt’s Prime Minister Haseloff pointed out on ZDF that the state could not take any strict measures in the fight against the corona pandemic. He also criticized it as “not practical” to seal off districts in order to enforce corona exit restrictions. Haseloff advocates a mixture of quarantine measures and a ban on accommodation for people who want to travel from corona hotspots to other regions – this is in line with current practice.
Saxony: Travel bans “almost impossible”
Saxony’s Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer (CDU) said that he could “almost exclude” travel restrictions for the Free State. Kretschmer tweeted: “We have large districts in Saxony. I can not imagine a scenario in which we can block an entire district with an exit ban.” That could be different in other regions of Germany with smaller counties.
Lower Saxony’s Interior Minister Boris Pistorius also gave a clear rejection of the proposal: “You can think of something like this in distant Berlin or Munich, but it’s not practical at all in terms of space,” the SPD politician told the “Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung” . Especially in large counties with several hundred thousand inhabitants and a corresponding size, it was not clear to him how appropriate controls could be implemented.
Question about feasibility
Berlin’s health senator Dilek Kalayci (SPD) also asked the RBB, “To what extent is this feasible?” Basically, she thinks it makes sense if people from Corona hotspots stay at home, said Kalayci. It was “difficult” for Berlin, she added. “The districts are the same size as counties in other federal states. Of course, there are no travel restrictions.”
“This is not a question of political negotiation processes,” Thuringia’s Prime Minister Ramelow said on Wednesday to the German Press Agency. What is decisive is what the local health authorities decide. “And everyone has to stick to it.” The responsible authorities at the affected locations would have to explain how to proceed.
Bavaria Prime minister Markus Söder (CSU) had already signaled consent to exit bans on Tuesday. This was followed on Wednesday by the North Rhine-Westphalian state government. These could “be helpful in acute emergencies,” a spokesman for the state government told the “Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger”. However, they would have to “be spatially and temporally clearly limited, also with a view to realistic, effective enforcement”. The measures taken for the first time in Coesfeld and Gütersloh “represented a blueprint for the” more precise handling of hotspots “”.
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