Joint appeal by employers' president Dr. Rainer Dulger and DGB chairman Reiner Hoffmann

Berlin, 5 July 2021: The social partnership is an anchor in times of crisis. Our social partnership has also proved its worth in the Corona pandemic. Trade unions and employers worked together at an early stage to achieve high hygiene standards in workplaces, reliable testing strategies and rapid implementation of vaccinations. We are part of the solution.

Out of deep concern that we are gambling away what we have achieved, we are now jointly addressing all employers and employees in Germany. Continue to be prudent and responsible. Continue to help protect people in the workplace from infection. Accept the vaccination offers. Don't let up on testing and continue to allow home offices where it is possible and makes sense.

We appeal to employers - wherever possible - to offer their employees in-company vaccinations and testing. At the same time, we appeal to employees to accept the vaccination and testing offers and thus contribute to a high vaccination coverage rate and a high level of protection.

Effective protective vaccinations are the royal road out of the pandemic. Several good, safe and effective vaccines are available in increasing quantities. Until high vaccination coverage is achieved, a wide range of tests will help to increase safety from infection and contain the pandemic.

We know that vaccination and testing offers can be an organizational burden for many companies in particular, but also a financial one. It is important for employees to be able to make a good and informed vaccination decision voluntarily. We are confident that with a joint effort we can make the national vaccination campaign a success and achieve a high level of protection. In this way, we are making an active contribution to normalizing economic and private life.