of tests from july 2022, together with a reduction in government subsidy, was intended to end fraud once and for all. on 5 august 2022, the national association of statutory health insurance physicians (naship) announced that it would suspend payouts to coronavirus testing centers, due to what naship said were unresolved legal questions regarding its responsibility in case of fraud under the new regulations in force since 30 june. a spokesperson for the chambers of pharmacists and pharmacists' associations called the decision a "scandal". economic stimulus measures on 1 march 2020, finance minister olaf scholz stated that the government was prepared for a stimulus package to mitigate the economic impact of the pandemic. on 3 march, markus söder, minister president of bavaria and leader of the csu, and the german minister for economics, peter altmaier, pushed for financial help for companies affected by the virus. on 9 march, angela merkel's administration announced measures to cushion the economic blow. on 6 april 2020, the kfw launched a new quick loan program (schnellkredit) in response to the effects of the pandemic on small businesses. the program presented benefits like two free years of repayment, 10-year period to repay the loan, and the kfw would assume one hundred percent of the risk from the loan. the maximum amounts a company could apply for under the program were 675,000 euros for companies with less than 10 employees, 1,125,000 euros for companies between 10 and 50 employees, and up to 1,800,000 euros for companies with more than 50 employees. according to the imf, state guarantees were 24.8% of germany's 2020 gdp. on 22 april, the federal cabinet approved the german stability programme. this programme presented a projection of the government's planned budgetary spending to deal with the covid-19 crisis. the planned package pledged 60% of their 2019 gdp in fiscal impulse (job and wage security), tax deferrals, and liquidity assistance. their proposed package was larger than other country's like the united states, the united kingdom and france. the programme included plans to spend 3.5 billion euros on health equipment and vaccine development, as well as presenting funding for job security and loan plans with the kfw. on 29 june, the german parliament passed the €130 billion stimulus package that had been adopted by the government on 12 june. actions include a temporary reduction in vat until the end of 2020, and a bonus for families with children amounting to €300 per child, to be paid in two instalments of €150 in september and october 2020. on 8 july, economy minister peter altmaier announced the release of non-repayable bridging funds for medium-sized companies with annual turnover not exceeding €750 million which have been affected by the covid-19 crisis. the amount of aid depends on revenue lost, and on the number of employees. companies have to apply for the funds through their tax advisors or auditors, a step that was intended to safeguard from abuse of the scheme, also in view of evidence that aid that had been made available at the beginning of the crisis had been misused. on occasion of presenting the scheme, altmaier stated that he expected some sectors of the economy to return to a phase of growth from october 2020. to mitigate the impact of the second lockdown from november 2020 on businesses, the self-employed, and associations and institutions who were required to close, the german government introduced an "umbrella" scheme, initially with an estimated budget of €30 billion. the scheme, termed novemberhilfe (november aid), received approval under the temporary framework of the european commission. with the lockdown continuing into january 2021, further aid was made available under new schemes. as with the novemberhilfe and the measures earlier agreed in july 2021, companies were usually required to lodge applications for these funds through tax advisors or auditors. the complex and changing rules for eligibility for funding led to complaints by these professions that they were overburdened. according to records published by the federal ministry for economic affairs and climate action (bmwi) in late december 2021, germany had to date spent 130 billion euros on supporting the economy, with about 60 billion and 55 billion granted as subsidies and loans, respectively. the document cited information from the federal ministry of labour and social affairs according to which the latter had paid out about 24 billion kurzarbeit support (kurzarbeitergeld) and about 18 billion for social benefits related to the kurzarbeit scheme, in total in 2020 and 2021. the bmwi said that these and other supporting measures would be continued into the first months of 2022. at the second anniversary of the beginning of the pandemic in germany in january 2022, the german economic institute estimated the economic loss resulting from the pandemic to be 350 billion euros. this was due to reduced consumption and secondarily, due to reduced investment activity. for the first three months of 2022, the experts considered an additional loss of 50 billion euros to be possible. they projected that economic recovery would take years. in a press release in february 2022, the ifo institute for economic research estimated the total costs of the coronavirus crisis for the years 2020 and 2021 to be 330 billion euros. court rulings and legal assessments court rulings in the first weeks of the pandemic, the major restrictions on personal freedoms that were a consequence of governmental anti-pandemic measures were not subject to substantial criticism by the judiciary. for example, the high administrative court of bavaria (bayerischer verwaltungsgerichtshof) on 30 march 2020 upheld the particularly stringent restrictions in the state, citing the limited understanding of pandemic risk as reason. the regulation during the first wave that shops and retailers were – with few exceptions – not allowed to operate if their sales area exceeded 800 square metres was challenged in several states, but successes of the challenges were in several cases reversed by higher courts. one of the arguments of the higher courts was that shops were able to continue to operate, and therefore limit their economic losses, by restricting their sales area to below the 800 square metre threshold. on 16 april 2020, the federal constitutional court ruled that the governmental lockdown imposed in march did not allow blanket bans on rallies; a small protest in giessen against the lockdown measures, the initial prohibition of which had prompted the court case, went ahead after the city mayor said that permission would be given. as the first wave of the pandemic eased towards mid-2020 and pandemic risk was better understood, government measures were increasingly often ruled to be overly restrictive, and some were reversed. in what was seen by observers as a possible signal of this development, a lockdown in gütersloh district was ordered to be halted by a court on 6 july 2020. by august 2020, administrative courts across germany dealt with hundreds of cases challenging restrictions. on 26 march 2021, the karlsruhe social court ruled that a one-off payout of €150 to adult recipients of basic social income (commonly known in germany as hartz iv) eligible as of may 2021, was unconstitutional. the payout had been agreed upon in february by the ruling cdu/csu and spd coalition as a support measure in the pandemic. the court said that an increase of about €100 for each month of the pandemic was necessary. on 30 november 2021, the constitutional court ruled that the federal emergency brake (bundesnotbremse) anti-pandemic measures in force from april to late june 2021 had been legal. one of two rulings concerned curfews and contact restrictions, the other concerned school closures, and both dismissed several complaints that had been lodged by christian lindner and other members of his fdp party. in justifying its decision, the court pointed to the serious pandemic situation at that time, the availability of online instruction of school pupils in lieu of face-to-face teaching, and the temporary character of the measures. on 28 december 2021, the constitutional court ruled that "without delay", provisions had to be made to prevent a discrimination of people with disabilities in case of triage becoming necessary due to a shortage of intensive care facilities. nine people with disabilities and pre-existing conditions had filed complaints at the court. on 11 november 2022, the bundestag in response passed a law that excluded age and disabilities as criteria in triage. on 26 january 2022, the constitutional court dismissed a request by the afd party to waive the vaccination requirement for access to the bundestag parliament for the commemoration of international holocaust remembrance day the following day. a 2g+ requirement had been in force in the bundestag since 12 january, with the exception made for the visitors' gallery having been dropped for the remembrance day. on 17 march 2023, the oberverwaltungsgericht (state administrative high court) of north rhine-westphalia (nrw) ruled in favour of three self-employed plaintiffs, in that final advice by the nrw government to the three, which had cancelled part of earlier lump sum subsidies of 9,000 euros, was invalid. the court admonished the unclear wording of the initial advice sent out in 2020. observers considered the ruling as being significant for similar cases at the federal level. legal assessments some observers considered the chancellor and state premier meetings from the beginning of the pandemic as effectively circumventing parliament, while others disagreed, citing the liveliness of the debating culture even during the early stages of the pandemic, and comparing the actions taken with the handling of the european debt crisis by the government in 2009. in an interview with neue zürcher zeitung in october 2020, the former chair of the constitutional court, hans-jürgen papier, opined that a large majority of parliamentarians had been too reticent in asserting the role of the bundestag in pandemic decision making, in spite of the administrative court of bavaria having demanded as early as april 2020 that longer-term lockdowns be enacted by parliament. he also said that the regular meetings of chancellor merkel and the state governors, the so-called bund-länder-konferenz, had created an "obvious discrepancy between political reality and constitutional law", and that there were no provisions for such a panel in the constitution (the grundgesetz). around the same time, florian post, legal expert of the spd, as well as several parliamentarians of the cdu expressed similar concerns about what they saw as diminished role of parliament. the powers held by individual states as provided for in the grundgesetz, including their independence in implementing anti-pandemic measures, always remained in force. about the anti-pandemic measures themselves, papier said in the october 2020 interview that "many" of them were unproblematic from the viewpoint of constitutional law, while others did not satisfy the principle of proportionality. protective equipment