Three-quarters majority rejects stop vaccination initiative
Published: Sunday, Jun 9th 2024, 17:00
العودة إلى البث المباشر
The rules for vaccinations will remain the same after Sunday's vote. Almost three quarters of the electorate rejected the popular initiative "For freedom and physical integrity" of the Swiss Freedom Movement.
According to the final results from the cantons, a majority of 73.7 percent voted against the proposal. In absolute figures, around 1,838,500 voters were against and 655,000 in favor. The voter turnout was 44.8 percent.
A glance at the voting map showed a united Switzerland. All cantons rejected the initiative. The lowest proportion of "no" votes was recorded in Ticino with 64.3%. The text was most clearly rejected in Basel-Stadt with 78.1 percent.
The initiative was able to convince a majority of voters in some municipalities. The municipalities of Cerentino and Campo (Vallemaggia) in Ticino voted most strongly in favor, with 73.1 percent and 70.4 percent respectively. The text received the third highest percentage of votes in Wachseldorn (Bern) with 62.3%.
Conversely, the Vaud municipality of Fiez rejected the initiative most clearly with 96.8%. The second and third highest "no" votes were recorded in Berken BE with 90.9% and in Chigny VD with 90.2%.
Initiators want to continue the fight
"We are considering launching the initiative again," Richard Koller, President of the initiative committee and the Freedom Movement Switzerland (FBS), told the Keystone-SDA news agency. Koller believes the reason for the clear rejection is that the initiative was not properly understood.
Of the larger parties, only the SVP supported the proposal. Valais SVP National Councillor Jean-Luc Addor saw the reason for the rejection in the short-term memory of the Swiss.
Beat Flach, GLP National Councillor and Co-President of the No Committee, expressed his relief at the result. "I hope that the issue has now been dealt with and we can get back to more important topics," he said on request. "As a society, we are obliged to care for the weaker among us. This initiative would have made this impossible," Flach was quoted as saying in a statement from his party.
Initiative stems from the pandemic era
The initiative came about during the Covid-19 pandemic. During the pandemic, the so-called certificate requirement applied for a time. Access to restaurants and other establishments was not permitted without proof of vaccination or recovery from the disease.
The initiative wanted to prevent these restrictions for unvaccinated people. To this end, Article 10 of the Federal Constitution, which regulates the right to life and personal freedom, should have been amended. According to the initiators, a directly or indirectly enforceable vaccination obligation should have been prohibited.
Vaccination without the consent of the person concerned is not possible even with the existing laws. The Epidemics Act provides for compulsory vaccination as a possibility, but only for certain groups and on condition that the population cannot be protected with milder and other measures. An official vaccination obligation has never been imposed at federal level.
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