Unvaccinated children are being forced out of classrooms in Vienna as parents accuse authorities of implementing forced vax for kids “through the back door”.
In Austria’s capital of Vienna, children who are not jabbed against the Chinese Coronavirus are being thrown out of classrooms.
Critics have slammed the measures implemented by the city’s government, with one concerned parent accusing authorities of implementing forced vaccination “through the back door” for the age group.
According to a report by Kronen Zeitung, unvaccinated kids are being forced to quarantine at home for a minimum of five days should their class in school experience a sufficient number of COVID-19 cases, even if they are able to present a negative test for the disease.
Meanwhile, their jabbed classmates are allowed to continue going to school as normal.
Children forced to stay at home due to COVID restrictions had also previously been able to avail of online teaching, however, under the new rules, those forced to stay away from face-to-face classes are to only be provided with a so-called “learning package”.
“This is compulsory vaccination through the back door, because unvaccinated students are excluded from active classes,” one parent of a 10-year-old told the publication.
Meanwhile, the Freedom Party of Austria FPÖ has also waded into the debate, denouncing authorities for dividing up children by their inoculation status.
“This division of children is particularly shabby,” the party’s Vienna head, Dominik Nepp, is reported as saying. “Instead of finally getting back to normal, the students are being divided up by the red-pink city government.
“[It is] completely unacceptable that unvaccinated but perfectly healthy children are excluded from school,” he continued.
Complaints regarding the forcing of children to get vaccinated come as swathes of Austria’s Lockdown restrictions are torn down, in what amounts to a major U-turn on public policy.
Restrictions completely banning unjabbed individuals from bars and restaurants were lifted on Saturday, along with a host of mask-wearing requirements, with children being allowed to return to in-person teaching maskless on Monday this week.
This represents a major shift in the government’s policy, with authorities having previously promised to keep those who are not vaccinated against COVID under indefinite lockdown rules.
However, despite this loosening, questions remain regarding the implementation of mandatory vaccination for all over-18s within the German-speaking country.
Austria’s government has claimed that the plans regarding the enforcement of mandatory vaccination are still set to go ahead, but emphasised that such restrictions were conditional on the assessments made by a commission of experts on the rules.
The commission — which is to be made up of health experts and lawyers — is to make its first judgement on the overall appropriateness of forced vaccination on March 15, mere days before penalties for the nation’s unjabbed are to come into force.