2024-06-23 01:10:45
Originally of the pandemic, the state was desperately on the lookout for masks – and acquired them in massive portions underneath particular circumstances. Ongoing disputes may nonetheless lead to vital prices.
The federal authorities is dealing with billions in dangers from ongoing disputes over the provision of protecting masks at particular circumstances through the coronavirus pandemic. Lawsuits have at the moment been filed in round 100 instances with a complete worth in dispute of two.3 billion euros, in keeping with a response from the Ministry of Well being to a question from FDP funds politician Karsten Klein.
The “Welt am Sonntag” was the primary to report on this. The end result of the lawsuits stays to be seen, Klein informed the newspaper. However one factor is already clear: “The results of the huge over-procurement underneath the then Well being Minister Jens Spahn (CDU) have gotten more and more devastating.”
The background to that is the federal government procurement of urgently wanted however very scarce masks for the well being care system within the early section of the 2020 Corona disaster. With a view to be sooner, the ministry used a particular process through which provide contracts have been concluded at mounted buy costs with out additional negotiations. In lots of instances, the ministry later refused to pay, citing high quality defects, amongst different issues. Suppliers and sellers then filed lawsuits. Criticism was additionally voiced afterwards that too many masks had been procured.
“To this point, round 80 disputes have been settled by way of settlements,” says the ministry’s response, which can be accessible to the German Press Company. The federal authorities has gained eight instances with a complete worth of round 50 million euros and misplaced two instances with a price of 230,000 euros. In complete, the federal authorities has paid out round 1.4 billion euros as a part of the particular buying process (“open home process”).
With regard to the continued proceedings, the ministry defined that if “a declare because of a judgment” is at the moment to be anticipated, this could be lined by remaining expenditure within the funds.
Division head Karl Lauterbach (SPD) had just lately promised to evaluation the procurement of masks through the Corona interval. The explanation for this was additionally criticism from the Federal Audit Workplace of the ministry’s actions underneath Lauterbach’s predecessor Spahn. The authority complained that 5.7 billion protecting masks have been bought in 2020 alone, however solely 2 billion of them have been distributed – 1.7 billion of them in Germany.