Editorial: The hopeful message from our youth

Most people harboured reservations about how to approach younger age groups and in particular those between 30-39 years old regarding the need to be vaccinated.

They thought that these young people would not respond to the state's invitation to participate in Greece's vaccine rollout earlier than expected.

In fact, their response exceeded all expectation.

From the very first moment that the appointments platform for this age group opened the results took everyone by surprise. There was a truly massive response.

Health ministry data show that by midday on Monday, 26 April, 110,000 appointments by people in this age bracket had been fixed for vaccination with the not very popular version produced by AstraZeneca. They surmounted any objections and reservations that had been expressed internationally and in Greece.

Government sources say they expect a similar response from the next age bracket (40-44) in line for a jab with the same vaccine. They calculated that at that pace over 200,000 younger citizens would have made an appointment within a few days.

By all appearances, the younger generation, which has come under severe criticism for participation in dangerous, massive "corona-parties" and for their supposedly anti-social behaviour during the many months of the COVID-19 epidemic, exhibited a picture entirely different from that which many created to depict them.

Our youth proved in the end to be more responsible in respecting both the needs of society (and in particular of senior citizens and high-risk segments of the population) and the duties of participation in our common public life.

Our youth shunned the "Sirens" of anti-vaccination conspiracy theorists and dismissed the sermons of a host of anti-vaccine...