A Canadian who has not been vaccinated against Covid-19 temporarily lost the right to see his 12-year-old son after a judge ruled that the visits were not in the “best interests of the child”.
The judge ruled on December 23 to suspend the father’s right to visit his son until February, unless he is vaccinated. The decision was made after the Quebec resident requested an extra day to visit the child during the end of the year holidays.
The mother contested the request and learned through social media that the father was not vaccinated against the coronavirus, according to the Canadian newspaper Le Devoir. The woman then asked for her visitation rights to be suspended.
The local newspaper reported that the child has already received both doses of the vaccine, but the woman lives with a partner and her two children under five, who cannot yet be vaccinated.
“Under the circumstances, it is not in the best interests of any of these three children for you to have access to the [filho de 12 anos] at this time”, said the judge, according to Le Devoir, “if he is not vaccinated and opposes health measures in the current epidemiological context”.
A family law expert told the local paper that the ruling is the first in the country to deprive the right of parental access on vaccine-related grounds.
The province of Quebec this week recorded the highest number of deaths caused by Covid-19 since the beginning of the pandemic and announced that it plans to levy a special tax on those who do not want to be vaccinated.
According to the provincial premier, François Legault, half of ICU hospitalizations for Covid are unvaccinated, although they represent 10% of the population.
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