VATICAN CITY, February 18 (Reuters) – The Vatican has told employees that they can risk losing their jobs if they refuse to get the COVID-19 vaccination without legitimate health reasons.
A decree by Cardinal Giuseppe Bertello, effectively governor of Vatican City, said that getting the vaccine was “the responsible choice” for the risk of injuring others.
The 108-acre Vatican City, the smallest state in the world, has several thousand employees, most of whom live in Italy. His vaccination program started last month and Pope Francis, 84, was one of the first to receive the vaccine.
The seven-page decree says that those who cannot be vaccinated for health reasons can receive another job, presumably where they would have contact with fewer people, but will receive the same pay even if the new job is a demotion.
But the decree said that those who refused to get vaccinated without sufficient reason would be subject to a specific provision in a 2011 law on workers’ rights and duties.
The 2011 law article says that employees who refuse “preventive measures” may be subject to “varying degrees of consequences that can lead to dismissal”.
The decree was signed on February 8 and later posted on the website of the governor’s secretariat.
Pope Francis is a strong advocate for vaccines to stem the spread of the coronavirus.
“It is an ethical choice because you are playing with your health, with your life, but you are also playing with the lives of others,” he said in an interview with an Italian television station last month.
The Vatican made the COVID-19 vaccination mandatory for journalists accompanying Pope Francis on his trip to Iraq next month.
Bertello, who signed the decree, tested positive for coronavirus in December and isolated himself.
There have been less than 30 cases of coronavirus in Vatican City, most of them within the Swiss Guard, who live in a community barracks. (Reporting by Philip Pullella Editing by Gareth Jones)