A hospital in the Berlin suburb of Potsdam will shut its obstetrics, gynecology and neurology departments on August 1 – along with its baby hatch, a safe-drop facility for unwanted newborns. The Alexianer St. Josefs-Krankenhaus is also eliminating around 50 positions. Simultaneously, the nearby Klinikum Ernst von Bergmann is closing its orthopedics and vascular surgery units, cutting twelve doctor posts. An online petition against the moves has collected nearly 7,000 signatures.
The closures are among the first visible consequences of a planned health-care reform that hospital leaders warn could trigger a far deeper collapse. Ingo Morell, president of the North Rhine-Westphalia Hospital Association (KGNW), told reporters that the government’s savings plan would strip clinics of roughly 8 percent of their revenue. The hardest hit areas would be children’s wards, birth clinics and palliative care units.
Morell appealed to Germany’s federal states to block the reform in the Bundesrat, the upper house of parliament. “Otherwise we will see massive staff cuts and site closures,” he said. Already, 75 percent of German hospitals operate at a loss. The reform, pushed by Health Minister Nina Warken (CDU), eliminates the practice of cross-subsidization – the internal transfer of profits from profitable departments to cover deficits in child medicine or obstetrics. A diagnosis-related group (DRG) payment system, already in place, makes running those specialized units even harder.
The damage is not hypothetical. In Ludwigsfelde-Teltow, south of Berlin, the Evangelical Hospital’s pediatric clinic will close on July 31. The operator, Diakonissenhaus Teltow, cited both the ongoing shift to outpatient care and the new reform requirements. Inpatient pediatric services will be consolidated at the already-strained Klinikum Ernst von Bergmann in Potsdam.
The Krankenhaus Rating Report 2025 paints an even bleaker picture. Last year, 51 percent of German clinics posted losses, a sharp jump from 28 percent in 2020. Twenty-three percent are now at risk of insolvency. If the so-called GKV Contribution Stabilization Act takes full effect, the share of loss-making hospitals could hit 60 percent by 2027 and 68 percent by 2030. Of roughly 1,600 hospitals nationwide, 401 are deemed particularly vulnerable.
The German Hospital Association (DKG) warns that up to 140,000 jobs could disappear by the end of the decade. That equals an 8.5 percent cut in full-time positions outside nursing. Warken defends the austerity measures as essential to keep statutory health insurance contributions affordable. The statutory insurance system is projected to run a deficit of more than €15 billion in 2027, which could swell to around €40 billion by 2030.
