Brussels: The European Commission president Ursula von der Leyan has called for a discussion about mandatory vaccinations in Europe as momentum grows in some member states for holdouts to be pressured to accept vaccinations.
"I believe it is understandable and appropriate for me to lead this discussion now about how we can encourage and perhaps think about mandatory vaccination within the EU," she said at a news conference on Wednesday. "We have the immunizations, life-saving vaccines," she continued, "but they aren't being used properly everywhere." Von von Leyen also stated that BioNTech or Pfizer, the EU's principal Covid-19 vaccine providers, will make doses accessible for youngsters in the EU in two weeks.
The President of the Commission stated that there is insufficient information on the new Covid-19 variation Omicron, which the World Health Organization has classified as a high risk. "We don't know everything about this variety," she noted, "but we know enough to be concerned."
The president made it clear that she was expressing her personal opinion, not advocating for a new EU policy. Her intervention comes as a growing desire in a number of EU member states to put more pressure on the unvaccinated, even before instances of the new type were detected in Europe.
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