Vaccines: fines for no vax too low, the controversy

For those aged 50 and over, the vaccination obligation has begun. There is time until January 31 to get up to date with the first dose. The fines are triggered from the next day. However, the controversy is already open because i 100 euro indicated are too low according to many starting with Roberto Burioni.

The fine is imposed only one, therefore only once. The Revenue Agency will do this and will cross-reference the data of the resident population with those of the vaccination registries.

The higher the penalty for those who come to work from February 15th without the Super Green Pass. The fine will give you 600 to 1500 euros. It applies to public and private workers over 50. There is a vaccination obligation for health, school and university personnel, for the police and for workers of the external services of the RSA. After 5 days, anyone who does not respect the rules is suspended from duties and salary, but does not lose their job.

Those who do not enforce the obligation are in turn liable to a fine of between 400 and 1000 euros. There is the same penalty for shopkeepers who do not check and for customers who enter without showing the Green Pass base or strengthened in shops and on public transport. This is the fine that is already made in restaurants. There are 10 days of closure for the managers of the premises who are caught three times at fault and therefore fined.

In other countries the fines are much higher. They are 600 euros in Austria from next February 1st for those who do not get vaccinated and the call every three months for those who have not done so brings the penalty that can arrive to 2400 euros. At the umpteenth refusal we get 3,600 euros. In Greece the obligation comes for those over 60 and the fine is 100 euros per month until they are vaccinated from January 16th. Funds for fines go to hospitals.

The controversy in particular was triggered on one of the sanctions: the lowest. There is a risk that, having to pay 100 euros only once, many would rather be fined than vaccinated. There are road fines for minor offenses that are higher. The same happened when the compulsory vaccination for children in school was reintroduced. Parents no vax paid the fine of 500 euros.

Filippo Anelli, president of the National Federation of Orders of Surgeons and Dentists, speaks of a “scarcely convincing sanction that does not lead to compliance with the rules”. For the virologist Roberto Burioni it is a joke: «Giving a one-off fine (€ 100) to those evading the vaccination obligation roughly equivalent to two parking bans (€ 41 x2) makes the obligation itself a grotesque joke. Sorry to see you come from a government that thought it was serious. I hope I have misunderstood ».