Opposition mayors are urging solidarity in the management of the coronavirus pandemic and ask the government not to reject their offers to help, the opposition Socialists’ co-head said at a press conference on Facebook on Saturday.
Ágnes Kunhalmi said one of the conditions of successful pandemic management is a high inoculation rate, adding that there is no right- or left-wing vaccine. Every available vaccine is better than getting sick, she said.
Kunhalmi said governing Fidesz would like to “spread the blame” for Covid deaths, while only the prime minister has the information necessary to take the decisions necessary to defend against the virus.
She said Hungary may be in second place in the European Union in terms of vaccination relative to population, but it is also among the member states with the highest Covid death rates. The reason for that, she added, is that Prime Minister Viktor Orbán prepared neither the health-care sector nor the general population for the second and third waves of the pandemic.
Kunhalmi said the government won’t allow vaccination centres to be set up in opposition-run municipalities because it doesn’t want to be outdone when the job is done better.
Ruling Fidesz said in response that the left wing was ready to risk people’s lives in the hope of gaining power and were being “very hypocritical”. “They deny being anti-vaxxers but right from the start, they have tried to create distrust in vaccines and hinder their licencing, and they initiated a ban on vaccines,” the party said. “It is shameful that in the hope of gaining power, the left wing are making an effort in parliament and in municipalities to extend the epidemic and slow down the vaccination drive, resulting in more patients and more deaths”, it added.
featured image: Ágnes Kunhalmi in the Parliament; via Lajos Soós/MTI
