By KIRSTEN GRIESHABER
BERLIN (AP) — Germany has strongly rejected accusations from U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. that it is violating patient autonomy, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The statements by the US Health Secretary are completely unfounded, factually incorrect and must be rejected,” German Health Minister Nina Warken said in a statement on Saturday evening.
Kennedy said in a video posted Saturday morning that he had sent a letter to the German minister based on reports from Germany that the government was “limiting people’s ability to act on their own beliefs when faced with medical decisions.”
The US health secretary said that “I have learned that more than a thousand German doctors and thousands of their patients now face prosecution and punishment for issuing exemptions not to wear masks or receive COVID-19 vaccines during the pandemic.”
Warken rejected Kennedy’s claims, saying that “during the coronavirus pandemic, there was never any obligation for medical personnel to administer COVID-19 vaccines. Anyone who did not want to offer vaccines for medical, ethical or personal reasons was not susceptible to prosecution, nor did they have to fear sanctions.”
Kennedy did not provide specific examples or mention which reports he was referring to, but added that “in my letter, I explained that Germany is targeting doctors who put their patients first and punishing citizens for making their own medical decisions.”
He concluded that “the German government is now violating the sacred relationship between patient and doctor, replacing it with a dangerous system that turns doctors into executors of state policies.”
Kennedy said that in his letter he made clear that “Germany has the opportunity and the responsibility to correct this trajectory, to restore medical autonomy, to end politically motivated prosecutions.”
Warken noted that there were no professional bans or fines for not getting vaccinated.
“Criminal prosecution was only carried out in cases of fraud and falsification of documents, such as the issuance of false vaccination certificates or false mask certificates,” said the minister.
He also clarified that, in general, in Germany “patients are also free to decide what therapy they want to follow.”
Former German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach, who was in charge during the pandemic, also responded, addressing Kennedy directly in
“In Germany, doctors are not punished by the government for issuing false medical certificates. In our country, the courts are independent,” Lauterbach wrote.
While most Germans were eager to get vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus during the pandemic, there were also protests by a small minority of vaccine skeptics in Germany, which were sometimes supported by far-right movements.
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This story was translated from English by an AP editor using a generative artificial intelligence tool.
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