Austria, Linz: In a shopping street there is a sign with the inscription “No mandatory vaccination !! Free choice for the people! ”.
Image: dpa
The Ethics Council had so far held back on the question of a general compulsory vaccination. That is changing now. One cannot ignore the fact that the pandemic situation is worsening, said the deputy chairwoman of the committee.
D.he deputy chairwoman of the Ethics Council, Susanne Schreiber, considers a general vaccination requirement to be conceivable under certain conditions. A compulsory vaccination carries the risk of lowering the voluntary acceptance of vaccinations due to its patronizing nature, Schreiber told the newspaper Rheinische Post. “At the moment, however, we cannot ignore the fact that the pandemic situation is worsening massively. If hospitals and intensive care units can no longer carry out their tasks due to the overload, we have to intervene – to protect the hospital staff and to protect the health of all of us. “
Schreiber said: “Depending on the drama of the situation, legal requirements on vaccination obligations – if necessary staggered according to risk – can no longer be rejected from an ethical point of view in order to get the pandemic under control in the long term.” Without adequate vaccinations you are simply not prepared for the waves to come, “if contact restrictions and lockdowns are not to be our constant companions.”
“We started thinking”
In the RTL Direkt program, Schreiber said that the Ethics Council had so far held back on the general compulsory vaccination. In the current situation, however, that is currently changing. “One notices that we start thinking a lot because we see: the numbers are increasing and we get into this very acute crisis situation.” “We have not yet discussed this in detail in the Council, but the signs point to change, in the sense of: another very detailed discussion.”
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