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COVID-19 VACCINES

Have more people in Germany been vaccinated than official data shows?

There is increasing evidence that more people have been vaccinated against Covid-19 than officially reported as the results of a new poll of the under-60s come out.

Published: 15 August 2021 19:39 CEST
Have more people in Germany been vaccinated than official data shows?

A new poll on Covid-19 vaccinations in Germany showed clear differences to the official figures that are reported by the German public health body, the Robert Koch Institute, German news magazine Spiegel said on Saturday.

According to an online, anonymous survey carried out by Infratest dimap in cooperation with the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW), around 75 percent of 18 to 59-year-olds said they had received a first jab by July 13th.

This is 16 percentage points higher than the official RKI statistics for that period, which gave the figure for this age group as 59 percent.

This backs up a recently published report by the health body themselves, which found a discrepancy between the figures from those it polled as part of its ongoing Covid monitoring (Covimo) and the official government statistics, at least for the number of people who had received their first vaccination dose.

READ ALSO: German public health authority to investigate ‘underreported’ Covid jabs

READ ALSO: ANALYSIS: Is Germany underestimating its Covid vaccination numbers?

One of the reasons for this given by RKI was that when the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine was administered, doctors reported it as a second vaccination dose and were unable to note the vaccine type or the age group of the recipient.

According to RKI’s Covimo poll, as many as 79 percent of the 18 to 59-year-olds surveyed said they had had their first jab. That was 20 percentage points more than the official digital dashboard indicated at that time.

The differences indicated that the actual vaccination rate is significantly higher than statistics show, DIW researcher Mathias Huebener told Spiegel. He was working on the basis of a first-vaccination rate of at least 70 percent for 18 to 59-year-olds up to July 13th.

If correct, that would mean around five million more people had received a first vaccine dose than the official RKI data indicates.

And, according to the ongoing Infratest survey, on 28th July, 80 percent of all adult respondents said they had received a first jab. This corresponds to a rate of 67 percent of the total population.

However, RKI statistics from this point in time showed that only 61 percent of the population had received their first dose, another difference of around five million vaccinations, according to Spiegel. 

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COVID-19 VACCINES

Italy’s constitutional court upholds Covid vaccine mandate as fines kick in

Judges on Thursday dismissed legal challenges to Italy's vaccine mandate as "inadmissible” and “unfounded”, as 1.9 million people face fines for refusing the jab.

Published: 2 December 2022 12:11 CET
Italy's constitutional court upholds Covid vaccine mandate as fines kick in

Judges were asked this week to determine whether or not vaccine mandates introduced by the previous government during the pandemic – which applied to healthcare and school staff as well as over-50s – breached the fundamental rights set out by Italy’s constitution.

Italy became the first country in Europe to make it obligatory for healthcare workers to be vaccinated, ruling in 2021 that they must have the jab or be transferred to other roles or suspended without pay.

The Constitutional Court upheld the law in a ruling published on Thursday, saying it considered the government’s requirement for healthcare personnel to be vaccinated during the pandemic period neither unreasonable nor disproportionate.

Judges ruled other questions around the issue as inadmissible “for procedural reasons”, according to a court statement published on Thursday.

This was the first time the Italian Constitutional Court had ruled on the issue, after several regional courts previously dismissed challenges to the vaccine obligation on constitutional grounds.

A patient being administered a Covid jab.

Photo by Pascal GUYOT / AFP

One Lazio regional administrative court ruled in March 2022 that the question of constitutional compatibility was “manifestly unfounded”.

Such appeals usually centre on the question of whether the vaccine requirement can be justified in order to protect the ‘right to health’ as enshrined in the Italian Constitution.

READ ALSO: Italy allows suspended anti-vax doctors to return to work

Meanwhile, fines kicked in from Thursday, December 1st, for almost two million people in Italy who were required to get vaccinated under the mandate but refused.

This includes teachers, law enforcement and healthcare workers, and the over 50s, who face fines of 100 euros each under rules introduced in 2021.

Thursday was the deadline to justify non-compliance with the vaccination mandate due to health reasons, such as having contracted Covid during that period.

Italy’s health minister on Friday however appeared to suggest that the new government may choose not to enforce the fines.

“It could cost more for the state to collect the fines” than the resulting income, Health Minister Orazio Schillaci told Radio Rai 1.

He went on to say that it was a matter for the Economy and Finance Ministry, but suggested that the government was drawing up an amendment to the existing law.

READ ALSO: Covid vaccines halved Italy’s death toll, study finds

The League, one of the parties which comprises the new hard-right government, is pushing for fines for over-50s to be postponed until June 30th 2023.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni had promised a clear break with her predecessor’s health policies, after her Brothers of Italy party railed against the way Mario Draghi’s government handled the pandemic in 2021 when it was in opposition.

At the end of October, shortly after taking office, the new government allowed doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals to return to work earlier than planned after being suspended for refusing the Covid vaccine.

There has been uncertainty about the new government’s stance after the deputy health minister in November cast doubt on the efficacy of Covid-19 vaccines, saying he was “not for or against” vaccination.

Italy’s health ministry continues to advise people in at-risk groups to get a booster jab this winter, and this week stressed in social media posts that vaccination against Covid-19 and seasonal flu remained “the most effective way to protect ourselves and our loved ones, especially the elderly and frail”.

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