Several people who went partying shortly after receiving the one-shot Janssen Covid-19 vaccine, said they feel mislead by the government. They said they feel that they were put in an unsafe situation and were not clearly informed of the risks. Health Minister Hugo de Jonge had encouraged as many young people as possible to get vaccinated by saying they can go ‘dancing with Janssen’ immediately after receiving the shot.
Lawyer for the non-profit foundation Urgenda, Marijn Kingma said to Nieuwsuur that if people develop long-term complaints from contracting the coronavirus while dancing with Janssen, they can sue the government. “I would dare to take such a case. They can call me”, Kingma stated.
The Janssen vaccine only offers optimal protection two weeks after injection. Neighboring European countries still required people to get tested during that two-week period, but De Jonge initially believed it was viable to allow freshly vaccinated people entry to events without testing. He said this would encourage as many people as possible to get vaccinated. A two-week waiting period was later installed.
Several young people said they had not been aware that the vaccine is only fully effective 14 days after injection. “I knew I could be at risk, but had I known the risk was this high I would never have gone out”, one partygoer stated.
Kingma said she believes the government has a duty to fully inform citizens about risks. The lawyer said that while people still also carry their own responsibility to look for information, in this case, they relied on the misleading statements by the health minister.
“I felt like it was safe in the beginning and not that it was just about getting young people to take a shot. I blame him for that”, one young man said about De Jonge’s statements.
If young people develop long-term coronavirus complaints and, for example, become partially incapacitated from work, they should be able to recover the damage from the state, Kingma said she believes.
On the website of the Ministry of Health, it is stated that the vaccine only offers full protection after two weeks. Nonetheless, on July 1 a spokesperson of the ministry told NOS that people were well protected enough that it had been “responsible” to allow them direct access to events.
