Anne Lévy, the director the Federal Office of Public Health.
Keystone-SDA
Anne Lévy, the director of the Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH), has defended the order for 61 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine during the pandemic.
+Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox
“At the start of the pandemic, competition for supplies was fierce,” Lévy said in an interview with the SonntagsBlick, published on Sunday. “It wasn’t clear which company had the best vaccines,” she added. “Imagine if we had bet on the wrong product or ordered too few doses.”
Switzerland administered 17 million vaccine doses on its territory and sent eight million to other countries. The rest was partly destroyed, partly not delivered, but paid for.
SonntagsBlick pointed out that over 70% of the vaccine doses paid for in Switzerland were not used. Lévy responded that Switzerland followed a strategy “based on safety”. Parliamentary oversight also found that the measures taken were justified. In the event of a pandemic, it is better to order too much than too little, she said.
By the start of 2026, Swiss authorities had logged 408 claims for compensation for vaccine-related damages. According to Lévy, 300 of these have been rejected after initial examination, two accepted and two refused, while others are still pending.
More
More
Too many Covid doses: Switzerland’s vaccine conundrum
Quarantine for Patrick Fischer
The majority of the Swiss population is banking on vaccination. During the pandemic, almost 70% of people were vaccinated, and this figure even exceeded 90% among the over-65s. “Whether or not to be vaccinated is a personal decision”, Ms Lévy said of Patrick Fischer, the licensed national ice hockey coach.
The majority of the Swiss population supports vaccination measures. During the pandemic, almost 70% of people got a jab; the figure even exceeded 90% among over-65s.
Asked about Patrick Fischer, the former coach of the Swiss men’s hockey team who was let go this week, Lévy said that it is a “personal decision” whether one gets vaccinated or not.
In 2022, Fischer travelled to the Beijing Winter Olympics with a forged Covid certificate. “He could have taken part in the Games even without vaccination; this would have been possible by entering quarantine. Other athletes have done so,” said Lévy.
Adapted from French by AI/dos
We select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools to translate them into English. A journalist then reviews the translation for clarity and accuracy before publication.
Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. The news stories we select have been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team from news agencies such as Bloomberg or Keystone.
If you have any questions about how we work, write to us at english@swissinfo.ch
