The husband of German outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel, Joachim Sauer
(Picture: AFP via Getty Images)Angela Merkel’s husband has hit out at the millions of “lazy and complacent” Germans yet to get their Covid jabs as a deadly fourth wave sweeps across Europe.
ProfessorJoachim Sauer, 72, compared the anti-vax movement to Creationism in the United States adding he was disturbed by the fact just 68 per cent of the German population were fully vaccinated.
With cases soaring Germany is considering whether to follow neighbours Austria’s lead to impose a new lockdown and make vaccines mandatory.
“It is astonishing that a third of the population does not follow scientific findings,” Merkel’s husband, Prof Sauer, said in an interview with Italian newspaper La Repubblica.
“In part, this is due to a certain laziness and complacency of Germans,” said Sauer, who rarely speaks in public.
“The other group are people who follow a personal conviction, a kind of ideological reaction to what they consider a vaccination dictatorship,” Sauer said, a group that includes doctors and scientists.
Acting chancellor Merkel, herself, recently told her conservative party that further lockdown measures were needed. She said “We are in a highly dramatic situation. What is in place now is not sufficient,” according to two participants at a private meeting.
It came as Health Minister Jens Spahn also called for further restrictions as Germany’s rate of coronavirus infections hit a record high.
The force of the pandemic’s fourth wave has closed Christmas markets and promped more politicians to back compulsory vaccinations, a divisive topic that is likely to face Germany’s new government. Only 6 per cent of the population are fully vaccinated.
The seven-day incidence rate jumped to 399.8 per 100,000 people on Tuesday, data from the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases showed, the 16th straight day it has hit a record level.
As the number of COVID-19 deaths in Germany nears 100,000, the United States advised on Monday against travel there.
On Monday, Spahn said that by the end of the winter almost everyone in Germany would be “vaccinated, recovered or dead”.
