‘Dangerous lies!’ Matteo Salvini ATTACKED over Italian Government’s vaccination programme

The Italian government is controversially looking to postpone a law, introduced by the previous centre-left government, which will make it compulsory for children to receive a programme of vaccinations if their parents want them to attend state school.

The law should have come into effect this autumn for the start of the 2018-19 academic year, but the new government are planning to postpone the legislation to the 2019-20 school year.

However critics believe this is a first step towards scrapping the policy entirely.

Stefano Bonaccini, governor of a northern Italian region, said: “halting compulsory vaccinations to surrender to the no-vaccination lobby sends us right back to the Middle Ages.” Both parties which make up the new Italian government, the populist Five Star Movement and the hard-right The League, are firmly against many vaccination programmes.

Matteo Salving, the anti-immigration leader of The League and new Italian interior minister, has described vaccinations as “useless and in many cases dangerous”.

He has also publicly suggested that they can cause autism.

Key figures within the Five Star Movement have long argued that vaccinations can be as dangerous as the conditions they are designed to treat and spread discredited studies linking vaccinations to certain diseases. President Donald Trump meets Italy’s Prime Minister Mon, July 30, 2018

U.S. President Donald Trump is hosting Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte at the White House to discuss global conflicts and promoting economic prosperity Play slideshow EPA 1 of 10 US President Donald J. Trump meets with Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte Giulia Grillo, Italy’s new health minister, has said parents will no longer have to show schools doctors certificates which prove their children have had vaccinations.

Meanwhile the upper house of the Italian Parliament has passed an amendment postponing the vaccinations law passed by the previous centre-left government for a year.

The government’s proposals have been aggressively attacked by many healthcare professionals. Roberto Burioni, a celebrated biologist, accused Mr Salvini of spreading “dangerous lies”.

He said the vaccinations “are the same ones used all over the world. They save millions of lives in total.

“They protect you, your children and also all the Italian cities that you have the duty to protect.” The number of cases of measles in Italy jumped sharply from 900 in 2016 to 5,000 last year.

Lawmakers from the opposition centre-left Democratic Party are calling for a “revolt” over the policy.

Davide Faraone, a Democratic Party senator, described the policy as “horrendous” and “really dangerous”.