Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach Blames FDP for Unaffordable Care in TV Column “Hart aber Fair”

So far, Jochen Springborn has invested 250,000 euros in the care of his wife who has MS. “It can’t go on like this forever,” he says. Springborn takes care of his wife at home. Actually, he would have to increase his salary himself, as is currently the case in the nursing professions. But of course that’s not possible. So he has to limit the help he gets from outside, for example through the nursing service. Jochen Springborn has been taking care of his wife for 20 years.

In the meantime he even experienced a breakdown. “I didn’t realize the point until I broke down.” He was ill for a long time afterwards. His conclusion: “Caring alone at home is not possible.” In the meantime, he gets help from outside – professional, but also friends and acquaintances. He has no prospect of a home for his wife. Firstly, the waiting time is two years, secondly, the homes are mostly designed for older people. Care beds for younger people are rare in this country.

Jochen Springborn: “There may come a point when I can no longer do it”

Jochen Springborn knows that he is treading on thin ice mentally and physically. “There can come a point when I can’t do it anymore,” he says. “But I always have a bad conscience when I do something for myself.” Springborn gets up at 6:30 a.m., administers medication, works part-time full-time in the home office, rushes to his wife’s bed in between, goes to bed at 11 p.m., has to out twice at night. 24 hours, seven days a week, 365 days a year. “My advice to everyone is get all the help you can get. It wouldn’t be possible without the helping friends.”

Federal Health Minister Karl Lauterbach listened carefully. “I have a lot of respect. This is an outstanding achievement,” praises the SPD politician. “I myself know how much money is left over there. I see that in my mother.”

Lauterbach: “At least one voluntary fully comprehensive insurance”

Minister Lauterbach would like to replace the currently existing partially comprehensive care insurance with fully comprehensive insurance, “at least with voluntary fully comprehensive insurance,” he says. But that cannot currently be done with the FDP. His predecessor Jens Spahn introduced subsidies on paper in order to reduce the personal contribution for a home stay, which currently averages 2470 euros, to 2000 euros a month. But Spahn did not underpin the whole thing financially. Lauterbach had to make up for that.

Lauterbach also doesn’t like the bad reputation that nursing homes are sometimes given. “Nursing facilities do not have a bad reputation. The people there are trying very hard,” he explains, adding: “We have dramatically exaggerated the economization in care. You have to turn that back.”

Nurse Behrendt-Stannies: “We can see what people are missing.”

“I notice a lot of things that are no longer possible,” explains actress Katy Karrenbauer, who takes great care of her demented father who lives in the home. As the cost of energy, food and wages rise and residents pay more, they often lack the little things that make life better.

Karrenbauer sometimes brings the older people coffee, sometimes cigarettes, sometimes skin creams and even a hairbrush. “It can’t be that people are crawling on their gums here,” she says, and reports that the nursing staff often cried too. Nurse Silke Behrendt-Stannies, who is also a member of the works council, adds: “Sometimes we nurses also buy sweets. We see what people are missing. Have a cigarette after dinner. You don’t pass by, you share.”

Katy Karrenbauer: “We only have three or four good years left!”

Minister Lauterbach explains that he intends to increase the grants for personal contributions by another five to ten percent. That is 57 to 114 euros more. And he calls for getting the money from the office. “It’s not undignified to be awarded a contract. It’s perfectly fine to get the taxpayer’s money after a lifetime of working.”

It could soon be the case for actress Katy Karrenbauer. From the sale of her father’s house, only a third of the 240,000 euros is left. “My father is 91 and really wants to live to be 100. I said to him, we only have three or four good years left!” When the assets reach 5,000 euros, the social welfare office pays. “Selling the house was bad enough,” she says. The father had to move from the 170 square meters into a “small room”.

Nurse Behrendt-Stannies: “There is no dignity”

Minister Lauterbach says that the Liberals are at least partly to blame for the misery. “The FDP has made it clear that they do not want to tackle the unfair relationship between statutory and private long-term care insurance,” he says. The high income would not pay anything into the solidarity long-term care insurance. This means that those with low incomes still have to help others with low incomes financially. “This can not be right.”

30 billion euros in reduced income came together in this way. Nursing specialist Behrendt-Stannies advocates fully comprehensive insurance as suggested by Lauterbach. “We don’t need a new law that would only tamper with the old system. We need a new system.” For the older generation, going to the social welfare office is “something very bad”. Many older people would become anxious in the current situation and withdraw. “The dignity is not given.”