97 percent bedridden, but fully employable for pension insurance purposes

[Mij]

The restrictive approval process for disability pensions is putting chronically ill people in dire straits – despite scientific findings. The case of a woman with ME/CFS from Lower Saxony illustrates the problems.

 

[Peter T]

A short piece in German

Using Google Translate:

On the day Emilia Kühne learned from the German Pension Insurance (DRV) that she could now return to work full-time, she lay in her bed in a darkened room. For the 39-year-old, it was another day in which she only had the strength for five minutes, just enough to sit up in a wheelchair and eat something. She spent the rest of the time lying down, shielded as best as possible from external stimuli.

In a letter dated October 17, 2024, the DRV Braunschweig-Hannover informed Kühne that she would no longer receive a disability pension. "According to our medical assessment, you can return to work for at least six hours a day under the usual conditions of the general labor market," it stated.

And it's not an isolated incident. Rather, Kühne's story shows how difficult it can be for seriously ill people to assert their pension entitlements – and how little the pension insurance company's decisions revolve around medical necessity.