In Slovakia, Health Minister Zuzana Dolinkova has resigned. She belongs to the Voice of the President party, the moderate force in the populist left-right government of Prime Minister Robert Fico.
Her resignation came after just eleven months in office. She justified it with differences of opinion over the budget, which envisages deep cuts in the healthcare system. The decisive factor may have been the report that the government representative for the investigation into the COVID pandemic, Peter Kotlar, presented a week ago.
The Slovakian Health Minister Zuzana Dolinkova announced her resignation on October 4th, 2024Image: Zuzana Gogova/Getty Images
In it, he not only questions the pandemic itself, but also calls for a ban on vaccination with mRNA vaccines developed by Western companies such as Biontech/Pfizer and Moderna. Experts contradict him. According to them, these vaccines helped to significantly reduce the number of deaths from the virus and the consequences of the pandemic.
This is exactly what Kotlar denies. “The most serious consequence of the entire fabricated operation called the COVID-19 pandemic is the endangerment of human health and the confirmation of the naivety of the world’s population to be subconsciously obedient,” he said when presenting his report.
Anti-vaccination activists in power in Bratislava
For example, Kotlar, a member of the ruling Slovak National Party, spoke out on YouTube during the pandemic against the then government’s measures and vaccination against COVID. This earned him considerable popularity, which helped him get into parliament.
The member of parliament and government representative for the investigation of the pandemic, Peter Kotlar, in the Slovakian parliament during his swearing in on October 25th, 2023Image: Vaclav Salek/CTK/picture alliance
Kotlar receives support for his call for a ban on mRNA vaccines from Prime Minister Fico himself. “You all know that I personally have always been against vaccination with experimental vaccines against COVID,” said Fico in his address to the government, which was published on Facebook at the weekend Nation. He added that he has “many acquaintances” who have had significant health problems after receiving the COVID vaccination. And he called on Kotlar to find out who enriched themselves in Slovakia through the “unnecessary purchase of medical materials and vaccines.”
High mortality during the pandemic
Slovakia was among the hardest hit countries in the world in terms of the number of deaths related to the COVID pandemic. In this Central European EU member state with five million inhabitants, 21,000 people died as a result of COVID. In addition to poor and underfunded healthcare, disinformation campaigns, distrust of modern Western vaccines and underestimation of COVID itself also contributed.
Covid tests during the pandemic in SlovakiaImage: Tomas Tkacik/SOPA/ZUMA Wire/dpa/picture alliance
The mistrust led many Slovaks to reject the Western vaccines and only deal with that Russian vaccine Sputnik wanted to get vaccinated. In the spring of 2021, then Prime Minister Igor Matovic sent a government delegation to Moscow to stock up on Sputnik. But after the EU did not recognize the Russian vaccine, it was ultimately not accepted in Slovakia and the vaccine doses had to be destroyed.
No cooperation with the WHO
Nevertheless, the government of Prime Minister Robert Fico maintains its negative attitude towards the mRNA vaccines and its doubts about the pandemic. As a first step, she announced that she would end her cooperation with the World Health Organization (WHO) on the COVID issue.
“Let us at least make the right gesture together by stopping the administration of mRNA preparations until effectiveness and safety are proven,” demanded Kotlar when presenting his report. The most serious finding is that mRNA preparations change human DNA, he claims. The vaccines have been inadequately tested and are therefore dangerous.
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is known for his rejection of mRNA vaccinesImage: Slovak Government/AFP
“This shows where Slovakia has reached after a year under Robert Fico’s government,” analyzes Slovak political scientist Grigory Mesezhnikov, president of the Bratislava-based Institute for Research on Public Issues (IVO), to DW. “After all, at the time of the COVID epidemic, Fico was probably the highest-ranking leader of the anti-vaccination movement not only in Slovakia but across Europe.”
Scientists’ outrage
“You can’t fight against unscientific facts,” said Health Minister Dolinkova resignedly as she announced her resignation. “Mr. Kotlar’s ideas continue to find support in the governing coalition, while they have no support in the world’s scientific circles.”
Before their use during the pandemic, the mRNA vaccines underwent rigorous testing by the European Medicines Agency (EMA). In 2023, the Nobel Prize in Medicine went to two researchers, Katalin Kariko and Drew Weissmann contributed to the development of corona vaccines with the discovery of mRNA technology.
There is correspondingly great outrage in Slovakia about the government representative’s report. His conclusions are described as wrong even by the Slovak public media, which is increasingly under pressure from the government.
Received the Nobel Prize in Medicine 2023: mRNA researchers Drew Weissman and Katalin KarikoImage: Peggy Peterson Photography/Penn Medicine
Doctors and scientists react even more horrified. “As scientists who have been involved in virus research for a long time, we are deeply concerned about the claims that Kotlar has presented to the public,” a group of experts said on the website of the Slovak Academy of Sciences. “The views presented challenge facts that have been reviewed and accepted by the global expert community and relevant authorities and cause discomfort to the public.”
The opposition is also protesting against Kotlar’s report and its conclusions. Oskar Dvorak, a lawmaker from the main opposition Progressive Slovakia party and deputy chairman of the parliamentary health committee, told reporters: “If we had a competition for uselessness, Peter Kotlar would win it. The pandemic investigation commissioner has no analysis, no evidence, but he is abusing his office to spread dangerous disinformation.”
