Enable digitalization and data access now to better cope with COVID-19 and future challenges

27.01.2022 18:20

The German Network for Healthcare Research (DNVF) welcomes the fact that the 4th statement of the Federal Government's Expert Council on COVID-19 takes up the DNVF's demands from its statement of February 24, 2021 on historical data for evidence-based and targeted pandemic management. There is currently no direct link between vaccination data and GKV billing data, meaning that important questions such as the effectiveness and safety of vaccinations cannot be answered.

The legislature should create a way to link the data as quickly as possible. Existing data resources can already be used without much effort to support political decisions based on evidence and to evaluate measures taken. Data structures and networks newly established during the pandemic, such as the University Medicine Network (NUM) with its NAPKON cohorts, must be made permanent and opened up for further tasks.

The DNVF follows the expert advice that the future challenges of our healthcare system, such as an aging population, an increase in the prevalence of chronic diseases, increasing expenses, climate change, unequal access requirements, etc., urgently require timely digitization and appropriate data access for care and science. In other European countries such as In the Netherlands, for example, this has long been a tried and tested practice.

The DNVF sees it as its task to continue to actively work on the digitalization of the healthcare system and the use of healthcare-related data and to provide scientific support for this.