Leading German doctor joins calls for broad booster campaign

Berlin (dpa) – Frank Ulrich Montgomery, the German doctor who chairs the World Medical Association, has called for the widespread use of Covid-19 vaccine booster shots, as a debate rages in Germany over how to vaccinate millions of vulnerable people before winter sets in.

“Everyone who was fully vaccinated six months ago should get a booster shot soon,” Montgomery told the newspapers of the Funke media group in remarks published on Tuesday.

He said a new, centralized vaccination campaign was needed in Germany this autumn, which ought to promote both Covid-19 jabs for the unvaccinated and booster shots.

“Because immune protection declines after six months, we as a society must have an interest in that protection remaining stable,” Montgomery asserted.

Germany’s top vaccine body said on Tuesday it was working “very intensively” on whether to recommend a third round of vaccination for everyone. A decision would be made “in a few weeks,” Thomas Mertens, the head of the vaccine commission told the Funke group.

Currently Stiko only recommends booster shots for the over-70s.

Montgomery said booster jabs ought to be administered by general practitioners, saying they had capacity as well as the experience needed for the task.

In contrast to Health Minister Jens Spahn, Montgomery said it would be a mistake to rely on vaccination centres again, noting that this would cost 10 times as much as vaccinating people at doctors’ practices. Many vaccination centres were shut down in September.

Another advantage was the fact that people would be more likely to go to their regular physician than to a vaccination centre for a booster jab, Montgomery said.

Spahn had called for vaccination centres across the country’s 16 federal states to be opened again to help offer more people a booster shot against Covid-19.