ATHENS – With Greece's New Democracy government trying to convince a hard core group of so-called “anti-vaxxers” and others reluctant to be vaccinated against COVID-19 can be barred from work if they don't, a legal expert has advised.

Speaking to state-run ERT radio, Professor of Constitutional Law Antonis Manitakis said, “any measure deemed necessary for the protection of public health – and which is backed by the health experts committee – is lawful.”

He disagreed though with Development Minister Adonis Georgiadis who said that private businesses should have the right to fire workers who refuse to get vaccinated against the virus.

“Dismissing (unvaccinated workers) would be an extreme measure (it's) neither necessary, nor legal,” said Manitakis, a former interior minister. He said companies could also can legally separate vaccinated and unvaccinated workers – by shift or floor, for example.

He said businesses have a right to require vaccines as a condition of employment although the government said it won't make them mandatory yet but might if the numbers of the willing don't hit the 70 percent of the population benchmark needed to roll back the pandemic.