Will the UK introduce mandatory Covid vaccinations?

Boris Johnson suggested he had not ruled out introducing mandatory vaccinations, telling yesterday’s Downing Street press conference that we need to have a “national conversation about the way forward”.

The prime minister said that he doesn’t believe that “we can keep going indefinitely with non-pharmaceutical interventions” such as enforcing masks and social distancing, just because a “substantial proportion of the population” has “sadly” chosen not to get vaccinated.

He added that there needs to be a discussion about “other things we can do to protect those who are hard to reach and haven’t got vaccinated for one reason or another”, to bring Britain back to the “equilibrium” it was in as a result of double jabs during the initial outbreak of the Delta Covid-19 strain.

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

However, Johnson reminded the public that he had said “right at the beginning” of the pandemic that he “didn’t want us to have a society and a culture where we force people to get vaccinated”, adding: “I don’t think that’s ever been the way we do things in this country.”

Downing Street rows back on comments

Downing Street has since backtracked on the prime minister’s comments, with an unnamed source telling The Telegraph on Wednesday evening that “the government was not proposing to bring in mandatory vaccines”.

And when asked whether the government was considering mandatory vaccinations on Sky News this morning, Health Secretary Sajid Javid said it was not, adding that he does not believe in “universal mandatory vaccination”.

“I think ethically it’s wrong, but also at a very practical level it just wouldn’t work. Getting vaccinated has to be a positive decision,” he said.

Which countries have mandatory vaccinations?

Several countries have introduced mandatory vaccinations as a vital measure to tackle vaccine hesitancy and boost public immunity as the pandemic rages on.

Greece and Austria will start fining the unvaccinated next year, while Germany’s new chancellor Olaf Scholz has said that he would vote in favour of a general vaccine mandate.

Evidence from countries that have mandated vaccinations for some workers and venue access suggest that the measures have proved effective in slowing infection rates. In France, for example, “vaccination rates have rocketed” while “Covid-19 cases have plummeted” ever since a vaccination “health pass” was introduced for cafes, restaurants, planes and trains, said Fortune.

Healthcare workers and mandatory vaccinations

On 9 November, the government announced that frontline NHS staff in England have to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19 by next spring if they want to keep their jobs, a move that will affect up to 100,000 NHS workers.

The government already requires care home workers and volunteers to show proof of full vaccination against Covid-19 unless they have a medical exemption.

Former health secretary Matt Hancock has described the case for compulsory vaccination across the NHS as “overwhelming”. Writing in The Telegraph in November, he said protection of patients is a “moral duty” and the science of the Covid vaccine is “comprehensively proven”.

“Mandating the use of the best science isn’t controversial,” he continued, adding “it’s common sense”.