Health Minister Johannes Rauch (Greens) continued to urge caution when it came to Corona on Wednesday. However, given the “multiple crises, there is no need to keep the alert level high.” There is talk of vaccination, medication and monitoring of the number of cases, he said at the European Health Forum Gastein (EHFG). Rauch and the other participants emphasized the importance of cooperation in the EU in the current crises.
“I think Corona will stay with us, but certainly not in the form we learned in 2020,” said Andrea Ammon, director of the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC). “We have to start treating corona like other respiratory diseases.” Virus monitoring and sequencing of new variants should continue. “We should at least maintain, if not increase, vaccination coverage,” the German doctor said. In addition, communication with the public should be improved.
Long Covid still a ‘hurdle’
In any case, Long Covid is “still a hurdle,” said Ammon, who was linked via video to the press conference in Bad Hofgastein. “We still know far too little about that”, and more research is needed. “We need to look at our ongoing crisis in non-communicable diseases,” added Ilona Kickbusch, head of the global health program at the University Institute of International Studies and Development in Geneva. There are interactions here with communicable diseases, for example, overweight people are much more susceptible to Covid and Lung Covid, the vice president of EHFG reported.
The topic of the health forum, which will take place in Salzburg’s Gasteinertal Valley until Thursday, is the “permanent crisis” of the pandemic, global warming and the consequences of the war in Ukraine. “It works, I mean that in terms of health,” Rauch said. For example, inflation also has “huge effects on people’s mental health”. “But we also need to spread the feeling that we can cope with these crises,” emphasized the health minister.
“Global crises need global answers”
“The key is European cooperation,” explains Rauch. “Global crises need global responses” is one of the lessons learned from the pandemic. As a small country, Austria had “looked too inwardly” and had domestic political discussions, he noted. If it is not possible to save European solidarity in the next six months, and if it is weakened, for example “by squinting at cheap gas”, “we will lose everything”, the minister warned.
“You can’t do anything alone when it comes to crises of this magnitude,” said EHFG President Clemens Martin Auer. He referred to the crisis in the health professions, “which will spread” and “possibly the biggest problem of this permanent crisis”, as he had emphasized at the EHFG the day before. There is currently a labor shortage “in all sectors. This is a phenomenon that we are seeing after the pandemic,” explains Rauch. There will be “tense situations” in the health and care sector. It is still about improving working conditions in terms of pay, rest and vacation times, says the Minister of Health, who is also responsible for social affairs and care.
Source: Krone
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