On Monday, Health Minister Constantinos Ioannou confirmed in his interview with ANT1 that Cyprus expects 1.2 million coronavirus vaccines. And once the medicines arrive on the island, every person will need to be vaccinated.

When journalists asked whether vaccination would be mandatory, the Minister of Health said yes.

Answering the question – will a person be able to refuse the vaccine? John was told that there would be no such possibility. However, he added – if 60-70% of the country’s population gets the vaccine, then from the point of view of the statistical model it will mean that the whole population has been vaccinated.

As this statement was immediately followed by a strong public reaction, a few hours after the statement, the minister was forced to clarify on RIK that the mandatory vaccination was not the government’s position, but his personal opinion. And he wanted to say that it was necessary to find a way to vaccinate as many Cypriots as possible from Coronavirus.

Currently, vaccination against Coronavirus is not part of the state immunization programme and in order for it to become mandatory, amendments must be made to the legislation of the Republic.

The Minister stressed that a very large number of people have already registered in Cyprus who want to try the vaccine voluntarily.

First of all, vulnerable groups are expected to be vaccinated by COVID-19, and then all others.

Ioannu stressed that according to the most optimistic forecasts, this will happen in late 2020 or early 2021.

Source CyprusMail