For the tl;dr skip to the conclusion.
Hi everybody!
Germany is having it's federal parliamentary elections - Bundestagswahl on Sept 26, 2021. I will share what the main parties have to say about pandemic prevention in their election platforms (Wahlprogramme). I will roughly summarize their positions in English and give quotes in German.
DISCLAIMER: I am not a journalist and am green/liberal leaning. If you spot any errors let me know in the comments.
I was looking mainly for proposals regarding prevention of future pandemics, but also included ones specific to COVID that might hint to a more general principle.
There are 6 parties in the Bundestag right now:
[party: leaning, seats in current Bundestag, link to election platform]
AFD: far right, 87, https://www.afd.de/wp-content/uploads/sites/111/2021/06/20210611_AfD_Programm_2021.pdf
CDU/CSU: conservative, 245, https://online.fliphtml5.com/kxyi/eyjg/#p=1
FDP: "classically"/economically liberal, 80, https://www.fdp.de/sites/default/files/2021-06/FDP_Programm_Bundestagswahl2021_1.pdf
SPD: social democratic, 152, https://www.spd.de/fileadmin/Dokumente/Beschluesse/Programm/SPD-Zukunftsprogramm.pdf
Grüne: left-green, 67, https://cms.gruene.de/uploads/documents/Wahlprogramm-DIE-GRUENEN-Bundestagswahl-2021_barrierefrei.pdf
Linke: far left, 69 (nice), https://www.die-linke.de/fileadmin/download/wahlen2021/Wahlprogramm/DIE_LINKE_Wahlprogramm_zur_Bundestagswahl_2021.pdf
| party | AFD | CDU/CSU | FDP | SPD | Grüne | Linke |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
words in election platform/program | 28,574 | 45,396 | 38,483 | 25,212 | 74,019 | 77,855 |
| mentions of "pandem" | 3 | 45 | 21 | 19 | 49 | 48 |
Several points are common or in conflict between parties. These pertain to their stance towards the WHO, COVAX, European health union, forced licensing of COVID-vaccines/suspending patents, medical supply security among others.
(empty point means no mention in Wahlprogramm)
The AFD requests a parliamentary investigation committee to scrutinize the legality and constitutionality of basically all public COVID health policies (not leaving out allegations of corruption against members of the government/parliament.)
Wir setzen uns dafür ein, dass im Rahmen eines Corona-Untersuchungsausschusses die gesamte Corona-Politik der Bundesregierung, die Ausrufung der Epidemie von nationaler Tragweite, der nicht im Grundgesetz verankerte Corona-Gipfel, der Einsatz und die Aussagekraft des PCR-Tests, die beliebig festgesetzten Grenzwerte, die Informationspolitik, fehlender wissenschaftlicher Diskurs, die Verhältnismäßigkeit der Maßnahmen, die Einschränkung der Grundrechte, verpflichtende Tests und Quarantäne sowie die körperlichen, psychischen und psychosozialen Schäden durch die Maßnahmen, die Maskenpflicht ohne Gesundheitsprüfung und die per Notfallzulassung eingesetzten Impfstoffe genauestens untersucht werden. Ein besonderes Augenmerk ist auf die persönliche Bereicherung von Abgeordneten und Regierungsmitgliedern im Kontext der Corona-Politik zu legen. (pp. 135)
The CDU/CSU wants to set up an "international pandemic treaty", but no details on what that would contain.
Deutschland wird die Initiative zu einem internationalen Pandemievertrag zur Stärkung der globalen Gesundheitssicherheit weiter aktiv unterstützen. (p. 69)
The FDP support the Conference on the Future of Europe and hopes it will make Europe more resilient to future pandemics. Besides that they rely on digital and health innovation to strengthen the health care system against future pandemics.
[Wir wollen] die Chancen des medizinischen und digitalen Fortschritts nutzen und das Gesundheitssystem an die demographische Entwicklung und an mögliche zukünftige Pandemien anpassen. (p. 28)
The Greens have the most numerous and specific ideas. They will evaluate/regulate/outlaw wild animal trade, wild animal breeding (like mink), industrial farming in the context of zoonosis (pp. 55). They also claim that the pandemic is based in a zoonosis ("Die Pandemie basiert auf einer Zoonose, einer vom Tier auf den Menschen übertragenen Infektionskrankheit." p. 55).
In the section on health and care, they have a headline "Für pandemien gewappnet sein" - "Being prepared for pandemics" (p. 116) with several concrete proposals for policy evaluation, reform and legislation:
The Left party mainly wants to strengthen public health services. They want to put the pharma industry under democratic control. The global distribution of COVID vaccines shows a "market failure". They propose building up public vaccine production facilities coordinated by the WHO/UN.
Souveränität für gute Gesundheitsversorgung statt Abhängigkeit von Big Pharma! Corona hat gezeigt: Angesichts des Marktversagens bei der weltweiten Versorgung mit den dringend benötigten Covid-19-Impfstoffen und der Gefahr zukünftiger Pandemien dürfen wir die Produktion von Impfstoffen nicht mehr Konzernen überlassen. Daher schlagen wir den Aufbau einer öffentlichen Impfstoffproduktion (im Sinne von Regional Vaccine Manufacturing Hubs) vor, weltweit koordiniert von WHO und UN. Die Kosten für den Aufbau von Produktionskapazitäten für eine schnelle und ausreichende Versorgung mit Impfstoffen, belaufen sich auf einen Bruchteil der Kosten für Aufrüstungsprojekte wie den Eurofighter. (pp. 38)
All party election platforms should be viewed as advertisements; what the parties will/can/want to do once in power/opposition may differ. We should also question whether more detailed ideas given by a party in their platform mean more concern or competence on this topic. Other parties could want to implement some of the same ideas and might just not have listed them in their platforms.
Future pandemics seem to be a non-issue for the AFD and non-priority for the FDP. The CDU/CSU seems to recognize some problems (their program mentions "bio terrorism") and express most determination to create a national storage of essential medical goods. Even though the SPD platform is titled "Aus Respekt vor deiner Zukunft" ("out of respect for your future") they remain quite vague; most SPD proposals are limited to increasing international cooperation on a global and EU level (similar to CDU/CSU). Greens and Left party have more specific ideas, while the Green party definitely gives the most concrete policy ideas. The Left party introduces the interesting idea of decentralized, local vaccine manufacturing hubs. SPD, Greens and Left support COVAX/global distribution of vaccines.
The existential nature of the problem finds little serious consideration in any of the programs, so no discussion of bio lab safety/lab leaks, research into rapid mRNA-vaccine development, bio terrorism, increasing availability of custom DNA synthesizers, meta-genomic analysis, pandemic early warning systems & rapid response ...
How do you evaluate the lack of serious forethought in these platforms? Do differences in the measures detailed in the platforms really correspond to differences in the parties commitment to effective pandemic prevention?
Looking forward to discussions in the comments or on twitter @masurt.
Thank you, this was really interesting! I voted already, mostly based on global aid, refugee, animal welfare and climate change considerations, but I would have wanted to look at pandemic considerations too if I had known a quick way to do it at the time. So I expect this to be a very helpful overview for others!
glad to hear that! share it far and wide ;)
yea, writing this a bit earlier would have been good, next time i guess :)