Rutte’s party pushing childcare vaccine mandate after whooping cough, measles outbreaks
The VVD is resubmitting a controversial bill from 2020. Outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s party wants to make vaccination mandatory for children in daycare if the vaccination rate is too low. The Netherlands is currently facing outbreaks of two diseases covered in the National Vaccination Program.
There is a nationwide whooping cough outbreak. Four babies have died of the disease so far this year. And Eindhoven is dealing with a measles outbreak. Fourteen unvaccinated children and one adult have been infected. Vaccination rates for children in the Netherlands have fallen since the coronavirus pandemic. In The Hague, not a single neighborhood meets the minimum 90 percent coverage to prevent outbreaks, GGD Haaglanden reported last week.
It is, therefore, time to revisit the bill that didn’t make it through parliament in 2020, the VVD believes. “These are diseases that you no longer have to get sick from. Because you can get vaccinated against them,” VVD parliamentarian Sophie Hermans told RTL Nieuws. “It is very worrying that this happens less often these days. And I also think that we should do something about it.”
The bill allows childcare facilities to refuse unvaccinated children if the vaccination rate was below 90 percent in the past year. The vaccination rate for the most important vaccinations - those against mumps, measles, and rubella, and those against diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus, and polio - dipped below 90 percent last year.
It does not seem very likely that the bill will pass through parliament this time around. Even the SP, which submitted the proposal with the VVD in 2020, now has doubts about it. The topic of forcing vaccination has come up for discussion every now and again in the past years. The Rutte III Cabinet investigated the option in 2018, and parliament pushed to revisit the idea in 2019 after a measles outbreak in The Hague. But it’s never gotten further than discussions.
The outgoing Cabinet is against mandatory vaccination if you want to put your child in childcare. State Secretary Maarten van Ooijen of Public Health thinks more can be achieved by doctors providing more information. “People are not that impressed by calls from politicians or the government about vaccination. What is especially effective are expert people who assist parents. Such as doctors and youth nurses at the clinic during individual conversations. That takes time and a lot of energy, but we will continue to focus on this.”
The GGD Haaglanden also plans to work more with community leaders like imams. Such community leaders can sometimes get through to people who refuse vaccination due to religion or distrust of the government or science.
