Austria is showing that vaccine mandates are no longer unthinkable

The rest of Europe will be watching closely as the country gets tough on unvaccinated people

People wait to get COVID-19 vaccines in Vienna, Austria, yesterday. Austria went into a nationwide lockdown early Monday to combat soaring coronavirus infections, a step being closely watched by other European governments struggling with national outbreaks that are straining health care systems. Picture: AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda

In the past few weeks, Austria has hit many new Covid-19 records — none of them good. On November 18, there were 15,145 new cases recorded, the largest number seen since the pandemic began. And the seven-day average for new confirmed cases per million people is at 1,395, more than double the rates in countries such as Germany, France and the UK.

The country’s fourth national lockdown began on Monday to last between 10 and 20 days. This makes Austria only the second European country, after Latvia, to impose lockdown measures since vaccines became widely available earlier this year.