Chancellor Scholz pushes for COVID-19 vaccine mandate in Germany

BERLIN - German Chancellor Olaf Scholz reiterated his support for mandatory COVID-19 vaccination in the country during his first briefing to the Bundestag (lower house of Parliament) on Wednesday.

Scholz said he hoped for a swift discussion in the Bundestag on a general COVID-19 vaccination obligation, stressing that "I, for one, believe it is necessary and will actively campaign for it."

Not getting vaccinated is not just a personal decision but has consequences for the entire country, he said. "There is no decision that you make just for yourself, and that is why mandatory vaccination is right."

The German government has already made it mandatory for healthcare workers to get vaccinated. The vaccination rate in the country stood at 72.2 percent on Tuesday, according to official figures. However, around 21 million people in Germany are still not vaccinated.

Alongside the COVID-19 vaccination campaign, the country's booster vaccination program would also need to be pushed ahead, Scholz said. The goal is to administer more than one million vaccines per day, just as the country did before the Christmas holidays.

Scholz also warned that COVID-19 case numbers would increase sharply due to the more contagious Omicron variant.

On Wednesday, Germany's Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases reported a new record of more than 80,000 daily COVID-19 cases.