President of European Commission says talks on mandatory vaccines need to happen

Ursula von der Leyen has said it her personal view that there should be a discussion at EU level about mandatory vaccinations for Covid-19.

The President of the European Commission said that although 66 per cent of the world's population is vaccinated, one third, or 150m people are still unvaccinated.

Speaking at a news conference to discuss the latest steps needed for the new Covid variant Omicron, President von der Leyen said that two or three years ago she would never have imagined the scale and depth of the pandemic adding the vaccines were life saving, but are not being used everywhere.

President von der Leyen said this would herald an enormous health problem and the issue needed a discussion and a common approach.