But now doctors are sounding the alarm: the vaccination is not going as smoothly in Germany as hoped. This is because the billing is not guaranteed. In Germany, the vaccine from the Bavarian Nordic company has been approved by the Standing Committee on Vaccination (STIKO). It can be used to vaccinate anyone over the age of 18 who has not previously received a smallpox vaccination. The STIKO recommends that anyone who is sexually active with multiple partners or who has an increased occupational risk – for example because they may come into close contact with infected people, such as hospital staff – get the Mpox vaccination. According to Norbert Brockmeyer, President of the German STI Society, a society for the promotion of sexual health, an estimated 500,000 people would need to be vaccinated.
The German Working Group of Outpatient Doctors for Infectious Diseases and HIV Medicine (Dagnä) had already pointed out the unresolved financing at the turn of the year 2023/24. Due to the now aggravated situation, the working group now explains in a letter to the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians and the General Association of Health Insurance Funds that, despite the legal obligation, no vaccination agreement has yet been concluded between the Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians and the health insurance funds.
As long as there is no agreement for the health insurance companies to cover the costs of the vaccination, patients have to pay for the double vaccination themselves. According to Brockmeyer, this costs between 70 and 90 euros. In case of doubt, the doctor’s practices would have to cover the costs of the vaccination process themselves. “Doctors feel left alone,” says Brockmeyer. “This can go so far that they do not carry out the vaccinations.”
In Hesse, according to the local Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KV), talks with the health insurance companies are ongoing, but it is not clear when they will be concluded. In Hamburg, the vaccine is currently still being procured centrally by the federal government and distributed by the social welfare office, and an agreement with the health insurance companies is pending, according to the local KV. The KV Nordrhein also stated in response to a query that the costs are not yet being covered by the statutory health insurance companies. Anyone who gets vaccinated must first cover the costs and can then submit the bill to their statutory health insurance company. There, the cost coverage is checked.
The Dagnä vaccination doctors are calling for an immediate vaccination agreement to be reached “so that we can make this important prevention tool available as a statutory health insurance benefit.” If this does not happen, a bureaucratic loophole could turn into a problem that – as the rapid containment of the Mpox outbreaks in 2022 showed – would be completely unnecessary.
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