Former Minister of Labor Norbert Blüm (84, CDU) is "paralyzed on his arms and legs". He announced this himself in a guest article in the weekly newspaper "Die Zeit". He contracted blood poisoning last year and then went into a coma. After months in the hospital, he was allowed to go home last week. The former politician says in the text he dictated to his wife Marita that he doesn't take the verdict as seriously as he should.
"I'm home"
His attitude to life does not accept to be paralyzed in the long run. "I feel like a puppet that they have pulled the strings so that their parts dangle in the air incoherently," says Blüm about his illness. Trifles, like a slight itch under the eye, would become problematic cases. Since his illness, he has judged some events in his life differently than before and the wheelchair is the watershed. Now he has fled into the arms of the family: "I'm home."
Under Chancellor Helmut Kohl (1930-2017), Norbert Blüm was Federal Minister of Labor and Social Affairs from 1982 to 1998 and was considered one of the most popular politicians in Germany during his active years. His slightly modified sentence "The pension is safe", which was borrowed from one of his poster campaigns, became legendary. The saying there was literally "Because one thing is certain: the pension".