Corona pandemic – vaccination boss Berger would be more cautious with recommendations today – News

• Christoph Berger, former president of the Federal Commission for Vaccination Issues, looked back on the vaccination recommendations during the pandemic in an interview with the “Sonntags-Zeitung”.
• He makes critical comments, for example about the unequal treatment of vaccinated and unvaccinated people.
• Berger would “act even more cautiously” today when it comes to vaccination recommendations for Covid-19.

“Of course, those who want to should be able to vaccinate. But recommendations that are primarily about protecting others and not yourself are difficult,” says Berger in an interview with the “Sonntags-Zeitung”. Berger goes on to say that this is why there was “resistance” during the pandemic.

A question that Berger would care more about today than he did back then is: Which recommendations are no longer necessary and how do we get back to normal? Berger would also “think and communicate even more clearly in scenarios today, as long as a lot of things are still unclear.”

But Berger also says that the measures were right at the beginning of the pandemic. They prevented deaths among people at risk and were supported by the vast majority of the population. It was “certainly right” to end the restrictions quickly. “Alain Berset has rightly made rapid progress compared to neighboring countries.”

Take people with vaccination complications seriously

In the second Corona winter with different measures for Covid vaccinated and unvaccinated people, this unequal treatment became “increasingly difficult” for people who had a low risk of becoming seriously ill themselves. As the chief physician in infectious diseases and hospital hygiene at the University Children’s Hospital Zurich says.

“In retrospect, this could possibly have been stopped more quickly after people at risk had had sufficient opportunity to be vaccinated and the effect of the vaccination on transmission was only small.”

In the interview, Berger also calls for people with complications after vaccinations to be taken seriously. Corresponding reports would have to be looked at and actual vaccination damage recognized. The federal government is currently investigating such reports. “Unfortunately, those affected will have to be patient until these are completed.” However, serious side effects after a vaccination are “very rare”.

Christoph Berger is followed by Christoph Berger

According to the “Sonntags-Zeitung”, Berger is leaving the Federal Commission for Vaccination Questions (Ekif) at the end of the year, having already handed over the presidency to his namesake Christoph Tobias Berger from Basel. Christoph Berger is currently still an Ekif member.

Berger says: “At some point, enough is enough. There are new people who are willing to get involved and are doing it very well.”