Associate Professor, Deakin Law School.
Lecturer, Deakin Law School.
J Law Med. 2021 Dec;28(4):993-1017.
Although Australia's rates of infection, illness and mortality from COVID-19 have been relatively low, they have escalated with the rapid transmission of the Delta variant. Restrictions imposed on people's liberties to curb the spread of the virus in several Australian States have engendered economic hardship, mental health challenges, and collective exhaustion and impatience. Several vaccines have been developed and approved for use in Australia that have proven effective in reducing the likelihood that the vaccinated will contract COVID-19 and, if infected, transmit and suffer serious illness and/or die from it. Public debate has thus centred on whether mandatory vaccination could be the panacea for Australia's COVID-19 crisis, and several Australian governments and employers have already imposed vaccination requirements. This article explores some potentially significant implications of mandatory vaccination for two areas of the law - human rights and employers' liability - to consider whether, from a legal perspective, mandatory vaccination could constitute a viable solution to Australia's present predicament.
尽管澳大利亚 COVID-19 的感染率、发病率和死亡率相对较低，但随着 Delta 变体的快速传播，这些数据有所上升。为了遏制澳大利亚几个州病毒的传播，限制了人们的自由，这给经济带来了困难，也给心理健康带来了挑战，还导致了人们的疲惫和不耐烦。澳大利亚已经开发并批准了几种疫苗，事实证明这些疫苗可以有效降低接种者感染 COVID-19 的可能性，如果感染了，也可以降低传播和患上严重疾病和/或死亡的可能性。因此，公众的辩论集中在强制接种是否可能成为澳大利亚 COVID-19 危机的灵丹妙药上，一些澳大利亚政府和雇主已经实施了接种要求。本文探讨了强制接种对法律的两个领域——人权和雇主责任——可能产生的一些重大影响，以从法律角度考虑，强制接种是否可能成为解决澳大利亚目前困境的可行方案。
