In a landmark decision delivered today, 8th April 2021, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has upheld mandatory vaccination as “necessary in a democratic society.”

The much anticipated decision in the case of Vavřička and Others v. the Czech Republic concerned the challenge of the Czech Republic’s mandatory vaccine requirement for children as being in breach of the right to a private life. The ECHR held that the programme was not in violation to Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

In the wake of the roll out of massive vaccination campaigns in most countries in the fight against COVID-19, the decision of the EHCR may have a major impact on the vaccination policies of European countries.

Facts

In Czech Republic, there is a statutory duty to vaccinate children against certain diseases. In the present case, the Applicants were unable to secure an admission to pre-school for their kids, given that the latter were not vaccinated.

Before the Grand Chamber, the Applicants argued that the consequences of their non-compliance with the statutory duty of vaccination is incompatible with their right to respect for their private life.

Decisions of the Court

The Court agreed that compulsory vaccination, as an involuntary medical intervention, represented an interference with the right to respect for private life. However, it also noted that there was a legitimate aim of the interference in that the objective of the legislation was to protect against diseases which could pose a serious risk to health.

More importantly, it went on to consider whether such an interference was necessary in a democratic society-

• The Court reminded that the Convention as well as other international instruments imposes an obligation on the Contracting States to take appropriate measures to protect the life and health of those within their jurisdiction.
• The Court emphasised that the purpose of vaccination is to protect the health of all members of society, particularly those who were especially vulnerable and on whose behalf the remainder of the population was asked to assume a minimum risk in the form of vaccination. The Court therefore considered that the statutory vaccination could be said to represent the national authorities’ answer to the pressing social need to protect individual and public health against the diseases in question
• The Court argued that as long as the objective is in relation to the protection of children against serious diseases, through vaccination or through herd immunity, where it was believed that a policy of voluntary vaccination was not sufficient to achieve and maintain herd immunity, the national authorities could reasonably introduce a compulsory vaccination policy in order to achieve an appropriate level of protection against serious diseases.
• The Court also observed that the vaccination duty concerned nine diseases against which vaccination was considered effective and safe by the scientific community, as was the tenth vaccination, which was given to children with particular health indications.
• Finally the Court held that the measures complained of by the applicants, assessed in the context of the national system, had been in a reasonable relationship of proportionality to the legitimate aims pursued by the Czech State (to protect against diseases which could pose a serious risk to health) through the vaccination duty.