The Constitutional Court defends the vaccination obligation with common sense alone

Perhaps there is hope that a text from our highest tribunal, the Constitutional Court, could be more useful than the words of the scientific community in helping people get rid of a series of pernicious lies that some – even specialists, or the usual exceptions that confirm the rule of scientific consensus – have been around for some time now. In particular, the text of sentence 14/2023 of the Constitutional Court on the legitimacy of measures aimed at the removal from work of health personnel who have refused vaccination against SARS-CoV-2. Although the Court’s decision had already been brought forward to December 2022, the sentence is particularly interesting for a series of considerations which, intending to respond to various objections raised by the referring judge, reiterate many specific points that the researchers, in their overwhelming majority, had already made present. Among other things, it should be remembered that in the judgment in question numerous observations and opinions of a large number of subjects were presented, all of whom sought the Court’s assessment on a varied number of points; the Court recalls in particular Droit uniform Asbl, the ContiamoCi Association and the Center for Studies Aligning Health and Health Foundation, the Committee for the right to home care in the Covid-19 epidemic, the Humanity and Reason Association, We lawyers for freedom, the president of the commission of the register of dentists of La Spezia, Corvelva Aps, National Coordination of vaccine injured, Ondav, Radical Science is Consciousness Committee, Legal Confederation for Human Rights, Critical CoScience Association, Coordination Association of the Italian Movement for Freedom of Vaccination, Comilva Odv, Campania Free Choice Association, Immune Committee Forever, Free Lawyers and World Organization for Life. Of all these, the Court recalls, all the interventions and opinions have a homogeneous content; even if these interventions are not allowed, in responding to the referring judge on the merits, those interventions are in fact demonstrated to be irreparably flawed.

To begin with, in the judgment we find that “the risk of occurrence of an adverse event, even a serious one, does not in itself make the provision of a vaccination obligation constitutionally illegitimate, constituting such an eventuality entitlement to indemnifiability.” This is because, explains the Court, “the protection of health also implies the individual’s duty not to damage or endanger the health of others with their own behaviour, in compliance with the general principle which sees everyone’s right to find a limit in mutual recognition and equal protection of the coexisting rights of others.” Therefore, the judges write, “in the context of this reconciliation between the two declinations, individual and collective, of the right to health, the imposition of compulsory medical treatment finds justification in that principle of solidarity which represents the basis of social coexistence normatively prefigured by the Constituent Assembly”. Basically, “until the development of medical science and technology allows for the total elimination of this risk, the decision to impose a specific health treatment belongs to the sphere of the legislator’s discretion, to be exercised in a not unreasonable way”.

Reasonableness, according to what was clearly clarified by the Court, it consists in the congruence between a decision taken by the legislator and the available scientific evidence, to which legislative action must constantly adapt, modifying its provisions if necessary. And, after a brief recall of the data available to the legislator when he imposed the vaccination obligation for healthcare workers, the Court finds “in line with the medical-scientific data which certifies the full efficacy of the vaccine and the suitability of the vaccination obligation with respect to the purpose of reducing the circulation of the virus, the non-unreasonableness of resorting to it, in the face of a highly contagious respiratory virus, spread ubiquitously in the world, and which can be contracted by anyone, characterized by rapidity and unpredictability of the contagion”.

What scientific evidence must the legislator take into account? Obviously not the ones produced by any, more or less self-appointed expert, but of the analyzes produced by the scientific medical institutions assigned to them: “it is on these scientific data – supplied by the sector authorities and which therefore cannot be replaced with data from different sources, even if attributable to ‘experts’ in the sector – that the political choice of the legislator was based; legislator who otherwise, instead of the institutional authorities, would have had to rely on ‘experts’ it is not clear with what criteria chosen.” And with this, the fluvial productions of a few anti-vaccine influencers and their associations go up in smoke, who on the basis of their titles, real or vaunted, believe they have the right to speak in the legislative seat in ways other than those delegated. Was Italy an exception, as often squealed nonsense? Certainly not in imposing the vaccination obligation on healthcare professionals, because, the Court recalls again, “the vaccination obligation for healthcare professionals has been introduced, among others, in France and Germany, as well as in the United Kingdom and in the United States of America.” And in addition “the courts, including constitutional ones, of some countries have considered the legitimacy of the obligation, making recourse to the canons of reasonableness and proportionality, used in a way similar to those developed in our legal system.”

With regard to a supposed lack of precautionary measures in vaccination, the Court clearly and in detail denied the findings of the referring judge; what is of interest here is a message that the Court itself seems to send to the sellers of smoke, when it specifies that “laboratory tests or other diagnostic checks are not required to be performed routinely before vaccination, as there is no evidence to support the usefulness of a their use extended, in an a priori manner, to all candidates for vaccination: there are no tests, including those of a genetic nature, which are recommended as pre-vaccination tests”. And why, if the vaccine was made mandatory, was it still necessary to collect informed consent? The Court writes that “the mandatory nature of the vaccine in question does not exclude the need to obtain informed consent, which fails only in cases expressly provided for by law”, and in particular that the “compulsory nature of the vaccine leaves the individual with the possibility of choosing whether to fulfill or evade the obligation, responsibly assuming, in this second case, the expected consequences From law. If, on the other hand, the individual fulfills the vaccination obligation, the consent, even in the face of the obligation, is aimed, precisely in respect of the person’s intangibility, at authorizing the material inoculation of the vaccine. There would still be much to write; but perhaps it is better to send the interested reader back to reading the sentence in its entirety, and content ourselves here with reminding everyone that, finally, it would be better to abandon certain arguments, contradicted by law, science and, above all, common sense.