Lengvarsky: Anti-vaccination Campaign Continues to Gain Momentum

Addressing the situation concerning the pandemic on TA3’s discussion programme ‘In Politics’ on Sunday, Health Minister Vladimir Lengvarsky (an OLaNO nominee) conceded that anti-virus measures could be tightened.

As for the possibility of introducing mandatory vaccination against COVID-19 for selected groups, the minister stated that there has been a lack of political for this move so far, adding that there are still unanswered questions as to whether how it could be enforced. “From the legal point of view, it shouldn’t be a problem. From the point of view concerning enforceability of vaccination, we need to determine how we would penalise those who wouldn’t have themselves vaccinated even if it became mandatory for them…,” said Lengvarsky.

“We don’t want to restrict people, nor we want to reintroduce the state of emergency. We want people to realise that [vaccination] is up to their decision,” he said, remarking that vaccinated individuals protect themselves, as well as people around them. According to the minister, as some people aren’t aware of this, anti-virus measures will probably have to be tightened eventually.

At the same time, Lengvarsky said that the steep increase in the numbers of new daily coronavirus cases hasn’t surprised him, given the low vaccination rate in the country.

Lengvarsky claimed that the vaccination rate among health-care workers currently stands at 70 percent, adding that when it comes to those workers who deal primarily with COVID-19 patients, the rate exceeds 90 percent among doctors and 80 percent among nurses.

Speaking of the anti-vaccination campaign in the country, the minister remarked it continues to grow stronger. “We’ll hardly persuade those who don’t want to have themselves vaccinated. Our mobile vaccination teams have been attacked in some towns,” he remarked.