AfD on health and care

The AfD wants to preserve care for extremely premature babies at the Dietrich Bonhoeffer hospital in Neubrandenburg. It calls for an exemption from the minimum case number set by the Federal Joint Committee, arguing that the rule leads to long transport distances in a rural state.

Neubrandenburg has a hospital unit for babies born very early. A rule requires at least 25 cases a year for this. The AfD wants an exception to this rule. Otherwise families must travel far to other cities.

The Federal Joint Committee requires 25 cases a year for a hospital to count as a top-level perinatal center. In the AfD's view there is no evidence that this requirement improves quality. Without an exemption, women with high-risk pregnancies and premature babies would have to be taken to Berlin, Rostock or Schwerin, which the party considers a medical risk. It points to more than 100,000 signatures for keeping the unit and says Greifswald will also be affected in the medium term.

The AfD wants a parliamentary committee of inquiry to examine the state's COVID policy. In its view, the government has so far only assessed its own actions. An independent assessment is meant to help avoid mistakes in future epidemics.

The AfD wants to look into the COVID years in the state. A committee in the state parliament should do this. The AfD says the government has only checked itself so far. The state should make fewer mistakes in the next epidemic.

The committee is to assess the measures of the COVID period in a neutral and unbiased way. It should take into account the published protocols of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI, Germany's public health agency) and other data that have since become public. The program argues that this is the only way to avoid mistakes in later epidemic situations.

The AfD wants to give local decision-makers legal and financial leeway to develop their own health care solutions. These include regional budgets, closer links between outpatient and hospital care, and municipally run doctors' practices. Municipal medical care centers (MVZ) should only be set up where there are gaps.

The AfD wants new ways to provide health care in rural areas. Regions should be allowed to find their own solutions. Towns should also be able to run doctors' offices. But only in places where doctors are missing.

The plan includes regional budgets and further easing of the divide between outpatient and inpatient treatment. New legal room is to be created for municipal practices, emergency practices with on-call doctors, mobile services for remote villages, and more pre-physician care by community nurses. The AfD wants to support public-interest approaches and a variety of providers, and to oppose models in which business targets take priority over medical ones. The program treats municipal MVZ as a last resort: they should offer employed doctors regular working hours without displacing doctors in private practice. Independent practices and free choice of doctor remain the foundation, according to the program.

The AfD wants to prevent hospital closures in rural areas, which it fears will result from the federal hospital reform. Basic care, emergency rooms and maternity units are to be secured statewide through individual budget agreements. The two university hospitals are to be strengthened.

The AfD wants to keep hospitals in rural areas. It fears a federal reform will lead to closures. Emergency rooms and maternity wards should stay everywhere. Special funding deals should pay for this.

The program counts intensive care as well as children's and maternity wards as part of basic hospital care. It cites the closures of such wards in Wolgast, Bergen and Crivitz as examples of what the AfD sees as policy unfriendly to families. Specialized hospitals, above all the two large university hospitals, are to handle treatment beyond basic and standard care. The university hospitals and their partners should be able to offer all service groups defined by the reform so that full medical training remains possible within the state.

The AfD wants to tackle the rural doctor shortage with incentives for young physicians, including a student loan that is paid off through work as a rural doctor. The rules for determining undersupply are to be revised and the position of the Kassenärztliche Vereinigungen (associations of statutory health insurance physicians) questioned. Red tape and documentation duties are to be reduced.

Rural areas do not have enough doctors. The AfD wants to bring young doctors there. They should get a loan for their studies. Those who work as rural doctors do not have to pay it back. Doctors should also have less paperwork.

The plans include internships in rural practices, changed university admission rules, and investment aid for practices on top of the physician associations' own programs. The AfD considers the increased rural doctor quota with its ten-year commitment to be right; anyone who does not meet the loan commitment would have to repay. Family doctors with a specialist qualification should be allowed to bill for specialist services. The AfD wants to abolish the link, introduced in 2026, between a practice payment and vaccination rates, which it sees as interference with doctors' professional freedom. Midwife care and maternity services close to home are to be preserved.

The AfD wants the state's licensing authorities to strictly apply the nationwide standards for doctors with foreign degrees. In addition, language support is to be offered alongside their work. The program justifies this with patient safety.

Doctors from abroad must speak German well. The AfD wants the authorities to check this strictly. These doctors should also be able to keep learning German on the job. This should keep patients safe.

The program sees the current requirements, general language level B2 and medical language at C1, as a necessary basis. According to the AfD, however, passing exams does not always guarantee communication in everyday hospital work, for example in emergencies. The party welcomes the 2026 federal reform under which a knowledge exam becomes the norm for degrees from non-EU countries. It regards professional skill and language confidence as equally important.

The AfD wants to give more support to grassroots sports as a form of preventive health care. Physical education in schools is to be preserved. Alcohol and drug prevention is to receive lasting funding and organization.

The AfD wants more support for sports for everyone. It says exercise protects against many illnesses. Sports should stay important in school. Programs against alcohol and drug abuse should get secure funding.

The program calls regular exercise the most effective and also the cheapest tool of prevention, for example against cardiovascular disease, diabetes and mental illness. Grassroots sports are therefore to be given more political and financial weight. Sports are to remain a fixed part of school education. Prevention of alcohol and drug abuse is to be put on a reliable financial and structural footing.

The AfD wants to give priority to care at home and introduce a state care allowance once the state's budget situation allows it. An emergency fund of 2.5 million euros is to support outpatient care services. In training, it wants to reverse the generalist nursing program.

Many old people want to be cared for at home. The AfD wants to support that. Later, the state should pay a care allowance for it. An emergency fund should help care services. Care workers should have less paperwork.

The state care allowance is meant to relieve family members and at the same time lower the cost of nursing home care. Through the "Pflege in Not" (care in need) fund, the state would pay municipalities grants for outpatient services. For nursing homes, the AfD wants to preserve a variety of providers and competition and to reduce cost drivers. It favors checking outcomes instead of extensive documentation, a skilled-worker drive instead of temp staffing, and simple recognition of foreign qualifications where ability and language are adequate. It also backs a voluntary community service year for school leavers, plus senior shared housing and multigenerational homes as supplements.

The AfD wants to upgrade the public health service (ÖGD) and organize it more efficiently. It is also to offer pregnancy counseling that the program describes as "life-affirming."

The public health offices should become more important. They should also be better organized. The AfD wants to give them a new task: advising pregnant women. The advice should favor having the child.

The program gives the ÖGD an important role in preventive health care. From this, the AfD concludes that it should be strengthened and its structures made more efficient. As a new task, it is to take on pregnancy counseling geared toward carrying the child to term.