future chancellor of Germany, Olaf Scholz announced on Tuesday (30) that a bill on compulsory vaccination against COVID-19 It will be proposed in Parliament before the end of the year.
With this change in the situation, the government hopes to persuade more citizens to get vaccinated before vaccination becomes mandatory.
“Many people still haven’t been vaccinated,” Scholz told Bild TV. According to him, making vaccination mandatory “protects all”.
The mandatory COVID-19 vaccine was recently approved for healthcare professionals and the military, and is expected to take effect soon.
If the new bill is adopted by the German parliament by the end of this year, the measure could apply to all from February or March 2022.
So far, Germany has refused to take this step, fearing that sanctions against the pandemic would further upset the part of the resistant population.
Although Example from neighboring Austria, which recently made vaccination mandatory for all eligible citizens starting February 2022, has rekindled the debate.
The current chancellor, Angela Merkel, at the end of her term declined to pass a law that addressed this contentious issue.
Scholz also avoided addressing the need during the election campaign, fearing that he would lose the vote. However, on Tuesday, the Social Democrats openly supported the move.
“Everyone agrees on the extremely serious situation in this fourth wave of the pandemic, sometimes dramatic at the regional level,” said a statement issued by the German chancellor on Tuesday, days before Merkel’s term ended.
The health situation poses strong pressure on the health system, with an incidence rate of 452.2 cases of Covid-19 per 100,000 residents.
“By Christmas, 30 million initial, secondary and booster doses will be possible”, the document indicates. The Chancellor also recalled that the third injection of the vaccination agent was recently opened to different age groups of the population.
According to a recent survey, compulsory vaccination is supported by 64% of Germans. So far 57 million people have completed the vaccination program in the country, which corresponds to 68.5% of the population.
On Tuesday, the German Constitutional Court welcomed requests from regional governments to reverse the illegality of restrictions considered radical at the start of the pandemic, such as curfews, school closures and restrictions on movement.
At the same time, many German regions hit by the new wave of COVID-19 have canceled their Christmas fairs and banned unvaccinated people from accessing public places such as sports halls and leisure centres.
Other measures are expected to be discussed by Parliament from Thursday (2), such as a ban on contact with unvaccinated people even in meetings and face-to-face meetings.
“It’s quite clear that the conversation needs to ease,” said the future chancellor, ecologist Robert Habeck.
