A few months ago, the government decided to make a corona vaccination mandatory from February 2022. This could become obsolete because of the omicron variant.
Corona numbers are currently increasing dramatically across Europe. In Austria, too, the Omikron wave is now causing infections to skyrocket. The criticism of the compulsory vaccination is getting louder.
Gartlehner: “Re-evaluate”
The epidemiologist Gerald Gartlehner rushed ahead in the “ZiB2”: According to his information, the planned vaccination requirement should be reconsidered from February. “We have to assume that after the omicron wave we will have achieved a level of immunity in the population that we never had during the pandemic,” he said. This immune protection will work “primarily against severe infections”. “And therefore you have to reassess the compulsory vaccination after the Omikron wave.”
The social partners also criticize the federal government. Not because of the compulsory vaccination per se, but they criticize the fact that no other measures were taken to induce people to vaccinate until it was introduced.
Compulsory vaccination could become obsolete with high immunity
As the medical law expert Karl Stöger emphasized in the “Ö1-Mittagsjournal”, the vaccination requirement could actually be delayed or even become obsolete due to the highly contagious Omikron variant. This would occur “if Omikron creates a high level of immunity in the population that is equivalent to or superior to that of a vaccination,” said the expert.
But if new variants keep appearing that require further vaccinations, that would be a strong argument in favor of compulsory vaccination. According to Stöger, the only alternative would be lockdowns.
.