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Austria: What are the rules for crossing into Germany?

Germany on Sunday closed its border with Austria due to the coronavirus mutation cluster in Tyrol. What are the rules?

Published: 15 February 2021 17:51 CET
Austria: What are the rules for crossing into Germany?
Cars line up at the German border with Austria. Photo: ODD ANDERSEN / AFP

Germany partially closed its borders with the Czech Republic and Austria's Tyrol on Sunday over a troubling surge in coronavirus mutations. 

A thousand police officers have been mobilised to ensure strict border checks, which recall the early days of the pandemic when EU countries hastily closed their frontiers. 

What are the rules? 

Under the new rules, only Germans or non-German residents are allowed to enter Germany. 

Anyone who enters must provide a recent negative coronavirus test which is less than 72 hours old. The evidence of the test must be in either German or English. 

Anyone entering Germany – including citizens and residents – must fill out the following form. 

The rules are in place until February 21st, but are expected to be extended until at least the start of March. 

Are there any exceptions? 

Some exceptions to the rules exist allowed. 

Cross-border workers and essential workers in ‘systemically relevant’ sectors, i.e. health and transport, are allowed to enter. 

All workers will need to provide evidence of an employment contract. 

They will however need to provide evidence of a negative coronavirus test. 

There are also some exceptions for urgent humanitarian reasons. 

People transiting through Germany will also be allowed to enter and will not have to provide evidence of a test. 

The rules do not apply to the Austrian regions of Jungholz in Tyrol and the Kleinwalsertal municipality Mittelberg in Vorarlberg

How are the border controls being enforced? 

German rail company Deutsche Bahn has suspended services to and from the affected areas.

At Frankfurt airport, the country's largest, federal police were on Sunday checking passengers arriving from Vienna and Prague.

Why are the borders being closed?

The restrictions are aimed at slowing the spread of new, more contagious variants that first emerged in Britain and South Africa, and have created new virus hotspots along the Czech border and in Austria's Tyrol region.

In addition to concerns over the coronavirus mutation, each Austrian state is currently above the threshold of 50 cases per 100,000 residents. 

Chancellor Angela Merkel's government recently decided to extend Germany's partial lockdown until March 7 because of the risks posed by the variants, even if daily infection numbers have fallen over the past weeks.

 

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HEALTH

Patients in Vienna face long waits for specialist health appointments

Waiting times to get appointments with health specialists in Vienna have increased significantly, a new study has revealed.

Published: 17 May 2024 09:56 CEST
Patients in Vienna face long waits for specialist health appointments

Accessing essential healthcare within a reasonable timeframe is becoming increasingly difficult for Viennese residents.

The Vienna Medical Association presented their new study this week which shows that waiting times for appointments with health specialists have increased significantly in recent years.

The study, which involved contacting over 850 doctors’ practices via so-called “mystery calls,” revealed that child and adolescent psychiatry currently had the longest waiting times in the city.

Patients can expect to wait an average of 90 days for an appointment.

Other specialisations where patients have to wait long to receive help include radiology (57 days), neurology (45 days), ophthalmology (44 days), pulmonology (36 days), internal medicine (33 days), and dermatology (28 days).

The waiting time for seeing a gynaecologist has increased fourfold since 2012, with patients now waiting an average of 32 days.

READ MORE: Why are there fewer public sector doctors in Austria?

No new patients accepted

In certain specialist areas, there is no capacity to accommodate new patients. The situation where no new patients are accepted occurs particularly often in paediatric practices, where more than half of the public healthcare practices have put a freeze on admissions.

In child and adolescent psychiatry, 40 percent do not accept new patients, and among gynaecologists, it is almost a third (30 percent). Family doctors also struggle with welcoming new patients, and many of their practices have already reached full capacity.

The Medical Association calls for immediate action, urging the health insurance sector to become more attractive and receive better funding. This could involve measures to incentivise doctors to work within the public system, potentially reducing wait times and improving patient access to care.

During the study presentation, Johannes Steinhart, president of the association, described the increased waiting times as the result of neglect within the established health insurance sector. He said he believes that the public health system is massively endangered.

Naghme Kamaleyan-Schmied, chairwoman of the Curia of the resident doctors in the association, pointed out that while the population of the federal capital has grown by 16 percent since 2012, the number of public doctors has fallen by 12 percent in the same period.

The association now wants to make the public healthcare system more attractive to doctors, which could cut down waiting times and make it easier for patients to receive care. The association’s demands for this to happen include increasing flexibility in contract options, integrating health and social professions in individual practices, reducing bureaucracy, and improving fees.

ÖGK, Österreichische Gesundheitskasse, Austria’s largest public healthcare fund, is currently creating 100 additional public health positions, with almost two-thirds of the positions already having applicants, as well as planning for another 100 positions. They also aim to create a central telemedicine service and a platform for making appointments by phone and online, which is meant to reduce waiting times and improve access to care.

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