A-Infos (en) die plattform: New sticker motifs from platform to corona virus available! (de

Our new sticker motifs for the corona virus will soon be available in printed form. We would be happy to send them to your home in 
German-speaking countries and would be happy if you help us to disseminate them. Just get in touch with us by email: die 
Plattform.org/kontakt ---- In the past weeks and months, the corona virus has spread across the planet and still thousands of people are 
infected with the virus every day. Governments around the world are taking steps to stop the virus. Here in Germany, too, we are encouraged 
to stay at home and to avoid social contacts as much as possible. Certainly: In order to keep the risk of infection as low as possible, to 
slow down the progressive spread of the virus and thus effectively protect people from risk groups, it is very useful at the moment to 
minimize direct, personal contact with our fellow human beings to reduce.

However, this must not and must not mean that the time has now come to withdraw into your own four walls for the next few months, if you 
have a roof over your head at all, and to trust that the state is constantly taking new measures will fix things again.
Especially in this situation, in which many wage earners are already suffering from the economic consequences of the pandemic due to layoffs 
or short-time work, in which people from risk groups are forced to stay at home and therefore can no longer take care of themselves, for 
example, and in which there are still thousands Under no circumstances should we close our eyes to the problems that affect all of us as a 
wage-dependent class in the refugee camps at the EU's external borders under potentially life-threatening circumstances. Now there can only 
be one solution: collective solidarity and mutual help!

In many cities across the country, spontaneous networks of solidarity have formed in the past few weeks, in which neighbors come together to 
support each other and provide very practical help in these times of crisis. So many go shopping for their fellow human beings from risk 
groups or have started to set up donation fences. The latter are used to collect donations in kind for all those who are in need of support 
because, despite the loss of wages, rent continues to be paid and other costs have to be covered. The solidarity networks created show that 
people in the wage-dependent class are able to help themselves through practical solidarity where they cannot rely on the help of the state.
Now it is important to continuously deepen these moments of mutual help of the wage earners and to extend the solidary connections that have 
arisen to other areas of life (such as our workplaces). In order to achieve concrete improvements in our living conditions, we have to 
organize ourselves in the long term - even after the end of the pandemic. Because one thing is already certain: someone will have to bear 
the economic costs for production downtimes and slumps in sales, and if it goes according to the will of the rulers, it will be all of us, 
the people of the wage-dependent class, who will take over the colliery.

Only together will we be able to fight back this attack on our class. Only together, through mutual help from below, will we be able to 
survive the pandemic.

Therefore show your solidarity with your fellow human beings, support and organize aid networks and network - not despite the crisis, but 
because of it!
Build on solidarity from below instead of trusting the state and parliament!

Not only does Corona kill. Not only the virus makes you sick.
Capitalism also does so by making health a commodity and organizing a "crisis management" that primarily serves to maintain production and 
profit, rather than the best possible protection of people.

What does it mean specifically when health becomes a commodity, that is, subjected to capitalist profit logic, instead of being treated as a 
fundamental right accessible to everyone?

The health care system in Germany was deliberately broken down for decades. Drastic austerity measures were taken and privatization was 
carried out wherever possible to keep the costs of medical care ever lower.
Hospitals should function like companies, cost less and, in the best case, still generate profit.

Those affected by such savings were and still are primarily those working in the health sector because, thanks to cuts in staff, physical 
and psychological stress and everyday stress are increasing, while they are being paid far too little wages for their important work.
At the same time, of course, the patients also suffer if their health is spared because they rely on good medical care that is accessible to 
everyone. In the face of an emergency, a potentially fatal pandemic such as the Corona virus, it is particularly clear that this is not just 
about waiting times at the doctor, but more specifically about human lives.

Elsewhere, far from the hospitals, capitalism and the state that supports it show that what they understand by "crisis management" is not to 
protect the population. Because in many places across the country, work in the factories simply continues, even in those that don't produce 
anything that is important for combating the pandemic. While our lives are severely restricted in almost all other areas to prevent more 
people from becoming infected, many employees should continue to come to work during the week. It doesn't matter that they can become 
infected there as well as in parks or on the train and bus. After all, production must not stand still, because where it stops, the 
capitalists' profits are at risk.

The state and capitalism are ready to accept thousands more infected and dead as long as the wheels of the economy continue to turn. And it 
is best that they turn even a little bit faster in the future. At least that's what the Ministry of Labor plans to "extend working hours": 
in some sectors, such as the pharmaceuticals industry or agriculture, the 8-hour day, which has been bloody fought for decades, is to be 
temporarily abolished, just so that wage earners can work 12 hours a day Day to work for the profits of their bosses.

But it is not only the ruthless continuation and expansion of work that capitalism imposes on us that makes us sick. In many places, wage 
earners are affected by layoffs or cutbacks due to the crisis, which in turn represent a physical and psychological burden.

The homeless have no way of responding to the "social distancing" request because thousands of apartments and hotel rooms are empty, but 
capitalist property relationships must not be touched.
All of this clearly shows that capitalism is unable to adequately deal with the pandemics we are now experiencing with the corona virus and 
to protect people. On the contrary, it creates the conditions for deadly diseases to spread ever more rapidly. Capitalism makes you sick.

Therefore, the creation of solidarity networks in the neighborhoods can only be a first step in reacting collectively and in solidarity as a 
wage-dependent class to the crises within the capitalist system. We also have to continue to network and organize with other wage earners, 
with the aim of building united revolutionary counterpower as a class and thus breaking the rule of state and capital once and for all.
So let's tackle it together and move forward together! When, if not now?

https://www.dieplattform.org/2020/04/25/neue-aufklebermotive-von-der-plattform-zum-corona-virus-verfuegbar/#more-1095
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