German lawmakers rejected legislation imposing a Covid-19 vaccine mandate on people ages 60 and older, a setback for Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his health minister, who had backed compulsory inoculation.
After a testy debate in the lower house of parliament, 378 lawmakers voted against the law and 296 in favor, a result that prompted cheers from the ranks of the far-right AfD party who had bitterly opposed it. Lawmakers were free to choose without necessarily following their party line and some members from Scholz’s ruling coalition voted against the law.
The mandate, which would have gone into effect in October, had been presented as a way to avoid further lockdowns and protect vulnerable segments of the population from the potential of another wave of infections.
“This is a very important decision, because now the fight against the coronavirus will be much more difficult in the fall,” Health Minister Karl Lauterbach said in a tweet. “Political finger pointing doesn’t help,” he added. “We will carry on.”
Germany’s latest wave of the coronavirus, driven by the fast-spreading omicron variant, appears to be ebbing from a peak at the end of last month.
Authorities are still registering more than 200,000 cases and some 300 deaths on most days, however, and some 15 million residents eligible for Covid shots haven’t been vaccinated. Almost three million of those are 60 or older.
Because it was considered a “matter of conscience,” the government opted not to impose a vaccine mandate itself, instead encouraging lawmakers to draw up legislation.
Scholz took the unusual step of asking Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, a member of the Greens party, to return early from a meeting Thursday with NATO counterparts in Brussels so she could cast her ballot.