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This is how the state government is advised in the Corona crisis | NDR.de – News – Schleswig-Holstein

Status: 01.03.2021 8:20 p.m.

Schleswig-Holstein’s state government is advising ten scientists during the corona pandemic. Their different disciplines lead to different approaches.

by Andreas Schmidt

It’s a magical moment when the morning sun comes through between the houses. Then it bathes the still frosted lawn of the Wacholderpark in Hamburg in a glittering golden light. In the trees you can hear the birds chirping. Gabriel Felbermayr now comes here more often to get some fresh air. The economist is President of the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW). He usually sits in his office in Kiel or travels all over the world. Now he usually sits at home near Hamburg’s Fuhlsbüttel Airport. Since there are hardly any aircraft taking off, it is quieter in his residential area – at least.

Economist Felbermayr: “Your knees are shaking”

Gabriel Felbermayr is one of ten scientists who are currently advising the state government. Politics is no stranger to him. Not even that his opinion is being asked. But the speed at which everything happens is breathtaking. “Normally we have three months to make an economic forecast, and on some topics we talk about decades. Now billion dollar political decisions are made within days. Your knees are shaking,” says Felbermayr.

He is used to thinking in different scenarios. But now he has to think much more carefully about what he is advising politicians to do, since some concepts are implemented immediately and can no longer be revised. “It makes you queasy.”

Further information


The state government wants to come out of lockdown in four stages. Eleven experts in the state parliament gave their opinion on this perspective plan. more




The body meets before the Prime Minister’s Conference

On a Tuesday morning in the Kiel State Chancellery. Prime Minister Daniel Günther (CDU) comes into the room specially set up for video conferences. Little by little, the faces of ten experts appear on the big screens, from psychiatrists to economists to crisis researchers. Whenever a prime ministerial conference is due, the committee meets virtually.

“There are not many people I have met more often in the last year than these experts. And it is quite an unusual constellation to say that about people, most of whom you have never met personally,” he says Prime Minister.

Psychologist: “Situation comparable to a war zone”

The scientists often advised him to do very different things, says Daniel Günther. The Expert Council has ten perspectives on every topic, all of which are well founded. For example that of Professor Kamila Jauch-Chara. The doctor heads the Center for Integrated Psychiatry at the University Medical Center Schleswig-Holstein (UKSH) in Kiel.

She observes more and more mental disorders in children and adolescents: fears, depression, but also mentally-related abdominal pain and headaches. “The situation can be compared to a war zone. People have the feeling that they have lost control of their lives. This affects children and young people in particular,” says Jauch-Chara.

Will a traumatized generation grow up in the pandemic?

That is why she always tries to work towards “as much as possible” when opening schools and daycare centers. The virologists, however, urge caution. Kamila Jauch-Chara is of course also concerned about the current infection numbers, but also warns of a completely different wave. “The psychological damage that children and adolescents now suffer in isolation will only really become apparent in ten to 15 years, when they will be adults.” A traumatized generation is threatened.

In the end, the risk is always borne by politics

The step-by-step opening plan, according to which the state government is now working, is the result of weeks of weighing up the various disciplines. In the end, politics has to decide and take the risk of being wrong. “Nobody does that for me,” says Prime Minister Günther. Hopefully this crisis will come to an end at some point. “Then we made a fixed appointment to meet in person at a table.”

The expert council of the state government at a glance

Uta Fölster, President of the Higher Regional Court of Schleswig-Holstein © Press Office OLG SH


Fölster is a lawyer and has been President of the Higher Regional Court in Schleswig since 2008. She studied in Kiel and was a public prosecutor, civil judge and investigative judge in Berlin. In 1992 she became press officer for Justice Senator Jutta Limbach and went to the Federal Constitutional Court with her in 1996. There she set up the press office. Before she came to Schleswig, she was President of the Berlin-Mitte District Court.

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