Coronavirus: is there a legal basis to force a Covid vaccination in Spain?



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COVID-19 :

The national health law is the basis of the 1944 law and the 3/1986 organic law on special public health measures provide coverage for any mandatory vaccination of Covid, although some lawyers are calling for the introduction of new tools to make compliance more effective, reports Efe.

the provisions approved in the last century in Spain for diphtheria and smallpox, including the ability to declare the vaccine mandatory, facilitates the legal path for vaccination to be enforced in your case, a measure which, although by law, is no longer popular among the medical community due to of the “counterproductive” effect it could have.

But where does it specifically say that the vaccine must be mandatory? The lawyer specializing in health matters and professor at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC) José Enrique Pérez Palaci explained to Efe that, as a first step, they provide for the right to life, physical integrity and the protection of health in both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights. man and the constitution of the World Health Organization (WHO).

In Spain, the first title of the Constitution take it right to life and physical integrity (Article 15) and Article 43 state that it is the responsibility of public authorities to organize and protect public health through preventive measures and the necessary benefits and services.

Furthermore, in the Law 22/1980, which modifies the Fundamental law of health In 1944, it was specifically planned that vaccines against smallpox, diphtheria and other infections could be declared mandatory by the government.

“Vaccinations against smallpox and the diphtheria and against typhus and paratyphoid infections it can be declared mandatory by the government due to the existence of recurrent cases of these diseases or the current or foreseeable epidemic state it is considered practical», He says this precept in his only article.

Still in force is a 1945 decree that approved the regulation for the fight against infectious diseases, which in its article 21 states that vaccinations against diphtheria and smallpox can be mandatory for all Spanish citizens, “their non-execution “. For lawyers like Perez Palaci, “By analogy,” the Covid-19 pandemic vaccine could also be declared mandatory.

Although the Patient Autonomy Act 2002 indicates that the person concerned can accept or refuse certain therapies, this right to decide has some exceptions, mainly the risk to public health.

Preserve public health

This risk is developed in the Organic Law 3/1986, which in its article 2 declares the possibility for the authorities to take all necessary measures to preserve public health.

For the lawyer, the issue of mandatory vaccination is, finally, the collision of two rights, the right to health protection, which prevails in the event of a pandemic such as COVID-19, and the right to privacy and confidentiality. .

“Now, if the existing legislation can create confusion, even the executive and the legislator can intervene in this sense and modify it by introducing relevant articles both in the criminal code and in a new organic law or a general law of public health”, he stressed .

For the Professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Barcelona (UB) Mar Aguilera, “Rather than declaring it mandatory by law, it will be essential to establish what are the consequences of not vaccinating“.

In conversation with Efe, Aguilera said that “it is important to clarify what the consequences are and that these are proportional”, precepts that should foresee and evaluate different cases such as “what happens if parents continue to take their child without being vaccinated against COVID-19 a school? “.

From the medical world, however, they insist on this it is not the most appropriate to declare the vaccine mandatory “Because it could have counterproductive effects,” Magda Campins, head of epidemiology at Barcelona Vall d’Hebron hospital, told Efe.

“If you force people, they can be more reluctant. We hope to obtain a high vaccination coverage of the population without having to fulfill the obligation “, said the doctor.



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