Overview
- The Bundestag announced her death on February 1, with President Julia Klöckner calling her a "political exception" and Chancellor Friedrich Merz praising her as a "guiding light."
- Süssmuth served as family, health and women's minister from 1985 to 1988, became the second woman to preside over the Bundestag from 1988 to 1998, and helped steer the move from Bonn to Berlin.
- She championed liberal reforms on abortion, advanced modern family policy and led Germany's HIV/AIDS response under the credo "Prevention instead of exclusion."
- As chair of the 2000 Zuwanderungskommission, she concluded that Germany needs immigrants, a position that remains a reference point in migration debates.
- She disclosed a serious breast cancer diagnosis in June 2024 yet stayed publicly active, capping decades of service in parliament and in prominent cultural and civic posts.