Billionaire Johann Rupert, who chairs Swiss-based luxury-goods company Richemont has responded to criticism about being vaccinated in 2020 against Covid-19 before the European country launched its vaccination programme.
“They are already on healthy 55-year-olds in Zurich from next Monday. The Richemont executive committee decided in December that the entire leadership would get vaccinated as soon as possible to set an example for the rest of our colleagues — many of whom were worried or scared or doubtful about vaccines,” Rupert said in response to an article in Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger.
Rupert told Business Day that that he had abided by all laws in the country and was entitled to get an early vaccination based on his co-morbidities. He did not elaborate what these were.
Tages-Anzeiger reported on Thursday that Rupert received a vaccination from a Mediclinic-owned hospital after he flew to the country in December, when only people who were 75 years and older were authorised to receive the injections.
Remgro owns almost 45% of Mediclinc.
Rupert allegedly jumped the queue, receiving a vaccine from the Hirslanden hospital in Frauenfeld, the capital of Thurgau before the start of the vaccine campaign in the Swiss canton, in mid-January, the article said.
Switzerland has 26 cantons or federated states.
Hirslanden hospital was awarded an exclusive contract to provide all of Thurgau’s vaccinations.
Rupert, who is turning 71 in June, said he had owned property and spent time living in the country and had contributed to the state while doing so.
“I have been a Swiss taxpayer since the start of Richemont, 31 years ago. My physician arranged it,” he said.
Richemont employs nearly 10,000 employees in Switzerland alone, most in factories. Another 4,500 people work for suppliers to Richemont.
“If customers do not feel safe walking into our 3,500 or so boutiques across the world, what will happen to the jobs in Switzerland? We need herd immunity as soon as possible for the world to avert massive unemployment and chaos,” he said.
Switzerland gave a greenlight to the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine on December 19, a few weeks before it had planned to launch the official vaccination campaign.
About 110,000 doses had been administered in the country as of January 18, which was 1.27% of the 8.5-million population.
The Swiss Federal Office of Public Health said that by the end of January, it would have vaccinated 4% of its entire population.
Rupert, who together with fellow billionaire Nicky Oppenheimer each gave R1bn to help SA small businesses through the pandemic, said he had paid Swiss Health Insurance for more than 30 years.
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