Lauterbach: Without hospital reform “we will have hospital deaths”

Federal Minister of Health Karl Lauterbach (SPD) promoted the project before new talks with representatives of the federal states about the planned hospital reform. “Without the reform, we will have hospital deaths,” he warned on Thursday in the ZDF “Morgenmagazin”. “Many hospitals will not be able to survive without the reform.” The economic pressure on the clinics is too high.

Lauterbach conceded that even with the changes he was aiming for, Germany would lose hospitals – but “much more and unsystematically without reform,” he emphasized. Municipal clinics in particular are often unable to keep up at the moment.

Karl Lauterbach advises countries on hospital reform

Lauterbach will again discuss his project with representatives of the federal states on Thursday. Accordingly, the German clinics are to be divided into three different levels of care: basic care, priority care and maximum care. In addition, the remuneration system is to be changed. The innovations should already take effect from the turn of the year.

Bavaria’s Health Minister Klaus Holetschek (CSU) again called for changes to the reform concept. “The countries should be able to decide for themselves which care takes place where. Everything else is unconstitutional,” he told the newspapers of the editorial network Germany on Thursday. “I see the supply close to home endangered by the current reform proposals, especially in large countries like Bavaria.”

Lauterbach must also “provide sensible suggestions on how to very acutely stabilize the financial situation of the clinics in view of the chronic underfunding,” added Holetschek. The transformation costs of the reform must also be discussed. “The reform cannot succeed without fresh money,” said the CSU politician.