France, Greece make Covid shots mandatory for health workers

PanARMENIAN.Net - All health workers in France and Greece must get Covid-19 jabs, Reuters reports.

In France, anyone wanting to get into a cinema or board a train will need to show proof of vaccination or a negative test under new rules announced by President Emmanuel Macron on Monday.

Unveiling sweeping measures to combat a surge in infections, Macron said vaccination would not be compulsory for the general public for now but stressed that restrictions would focus on those who are not vaccinated.

"We must go towards vaccination of all French people, it is the only way towards a normal life," Macron said in a televised address to the nation.

France has gone from an average of more than 400,000 first injections per day at the end of May to about 165,000 per day now. Some 53.1% of the French have had a single dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 40.6% are fully inoculated - not enough to stop the virus' spread.

Greece, meanwhile, has made vaccinations against Covid-19 mandatory for certain workers and announced restrictions to contain the spread of the virus as infections have kept rising during the vital summer tourism season.

"The country will not shut down again because of some," Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said in a televised address announcing the measures.

"It is not Greece that is in danger, but unvaccinated Greeks."

Nursing home staff will need to get vaccinated immediately, while healthcare workers will have to be vaccinated starting Sept. 1, Mitsotakis said.

A country of 11 million people, Greece has so far administered more than 5,200,000 first shots and about 41% of the general population is fully vaccinated.