Russia may ban entry for migrants without vaccinations

The Russian authorities are considering the possibility of vaccinating labor migrants to prevent the spread of a new virus.

A member of the Human Rights Council (HRC) of Russia, doctor Olga Demicheva, proposed to consider the issue of mandatory vaccination for labor migrants arriving in the Russian Federation.

According to Demicheva, migrants often bring infections to Russia, which can cause even vaccinated citizens to fall ill. She cited the outbreak of meningococcal infection as an example, noting that it was labor migrants who brought it to the Russian Federation.

“The issue of safety related to preventing such outbreaks should involve both vaccinating the population of our country and mandatory vaccination for those who want to work in the Russian Federation,” she emphasized.

This proposal came amid increasingly heated discussions in Russian society regarding the state’s attitude towards migrants. Human rights defenders and representatives of civil society warn that sharp criticism of migrants and shifting social problems onto them may lead to an increase in xenophobia, discrimination, and violence.

Considering that over a million Tajik labor migrants are working in Russia, the adoption of new rules could be beneficial for their health on one hand, but on the other hand, when attempting to implement such measures in practice, certain groups and employees of Russian law enforcement agencies often extort money from migrants under various pretexts.

Due to the outbreak of meningococcal infection that began this year, more than 1,200 cases of the disease have already been registered across the country. Doctors claim that one of the reasons the country is unexpectedly facing a meningococcal threat is labor migration. Currently, strains of meningitis that were originally characteristic of southern regions are gaining strength, according to government representatives, particularly in southern regions, including Central Asian countries.