Gulyás said Hungary could "return to normalcy" by the summer unless a new virus mutation resistant to all available vaccines emerged.Continue reading
The security of Europe depends on the vaccination rate of its population, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said in a video recorded in Porto, in Portugal, and published on Facebook on Friday.
Speaking ahead of a European Union summit meeting focusing on social security, Orbán said that the community could only be made socially secure “if all citizens have access to vaccination, because without the shots people could get sick, lose their jobs, and become unable to support their families”.
“Hungary has something to say,” he said, adding that life (in Hungary) “has almost fully reopened, with people having access to nearly all services if they are vaccinated and with their freedom regained, while it is not like that in many other European countries”.
Orbán said he would propose that the EU should grant approval to “all proven effective and safe vaccines” and speed up the vaccination drive. “Shots save lives, and Europe’s security depends on the vaccination rate of its people,” he stressed.
In a statement, made on arrival in Porto, Orbán said that Hungary “has a welfare model of its own, aimed at full employment, which the country is very close to”. The country has completed a work-based society, supported by full employment, strong family policies and family support totalling 5 percent of GDP.
“Our system is working well and we are ready to share our experience with others,” the prime minister said.
Answering a question, Orbán said it was “fundamental” that women and men should be treated equally. He added, however, that he, as a Christian man, saw the only problem “with the use of gender as an ideologically motivated term”. “The meaning is vague, somewhere between woman and man,” he said, adding that equality between women and men should be emphasized rather than equality between the sexes.
The two-day informal summit, starting later on Friday, will focus on welfare policies, issues around the pandemic and measures aimed at tackling those challenges.