With Belgium beginning to lift some of its lockdown restrictions, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo has stressed that vaccinations remain a key to getting out of the pandemic.
“It is abundantly clear that vaccination remains crucial,” De Croo said on Friday when he announced the plan to leave the lockdown.
“There is actually no real exit plan,” he said, “the real exit plan is the vaccination plan.”
As of March 8, people can meet up outside with up to 10 others, but social distance measures must still be followed and a face mask must be worn.
The Prime Ministers comment on the importance of the roll-out of vaccines, as the Belgian Order of Physicians – a body that requires all doctors to be registered to practice medicine – has warned that it will take a stricter approach to doctors who report the effect of corona vaccines.
Physicians will be faced with “serious measures against the dissemination of information, mostly through social media, that are inconsistent with the current state of scientific knowledge,” said the warrant’s vice president, Dr. Michel Deneyer, on Friday against CNN.
Dr. Deneyer warned that “disinformation could have disastrous consequences” and that “there is no question that doctors need to work together for the planned vaccination program.”
The success of the Belgian vaccination campaign and the achievement of the national target of vaccinating 70% of the adult population, “depends very much on the (continued) confidence of the population and of the medical force,” he said.
“The population has great confidence in the general practitioner, in the pharmacist, in the experts. Their advice is followed, ” added Deneyer.
Any doctor caught spreading disinformation will undergo a disciplinary hearing before one of the order’s ten local “provincial councils” and face up to two months’ suspension, he explained.
Deneyer said “a few doctors” had already been suspended but were unable to confirm the exact numbers, citing confidentially.