Pro Switzerland submits petition on pandemic agreement
Published: Friday, Apr 26th 2024, 13:21
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Pro Switzerland submitted the petition "WHO pandemic agreement - no thanks" to the parliamentary services on Friday. The group believes that the National Council and Council of States must have the final say on the agreement.
The petition aims to ensure that the WHO pandemic agreement is submitted to parliament and not signed, Pro Switzerland announced on Friday. This is because it wants to establish binding rules for pandemics that take precedence over national laws.
The agreement contains "numerous delicate elements", such as an obligation for the signatory states to influence public communication, invalidate critical voices and combat false or misleading information or disinformation, it continued. Tensions with Switzerland's federalist system of competencies would also be inevitable, according to Pro Switzerland.
The petition was launched in March. On April 17, the National Council had already adopted a motion from the SVP parliamentary group supporting this demand. Nevertheless, the Federal Council has so far taken the position that the agreement does not necessarily have to be submitted to parliament, Pro Switzerland wrote.
Lessons from the corona crisis
The decision to draw up an international pandemic agreement was taken by the 194 WHO member states in December 2021 in order to learn the lessons of the coronavirus crisis. In order to be better prepared for future health crises and to be able to react more quickly and in a more targeted manner in the event of a pandemic, a legally binding international agreement with clear rules in the areas of prevention, preparedness and response is now to be agreed.
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