Jaap van Delden July 6, 2026 Vaccination project manager
While the interrogation of Marjolijn Sonnema was somewhat grating because of the critical policy questions that were asked, the interrogation of Jaap van Delden was a display of pure official businesslikeness. As a vaccination project manager, he was one of the real implementers of government policy. And that's exactly what he remained: a performer.
The professional logistics machine
Van Delden came across as a capable, energetic project manager who took the assignment - rolling out the vaccination program as quickly and efficiently as possible - seriously and professionally. He hardly interfered with the substantive side of the work. For him it was a complex logistical puzzle: locations, planning, flows, ICT systems, difficult privacy laws, cooperation with general practitioners and GGDs. Nothing more, nothing less. In that sense, he fit the classic profile of the loyal civil servant: politics determines the direction, he ensures that it happens.
His account was therefore neither confrontational nor revealing. There was no visible moral discomfort, no reflection on proportionality, no doubt about the speed and pressure under which the program with barely tested vaccines was rolled out.
He only identified practical problems: the route via GPs turned out to be unfeasible while there was no Plan B; there were significant legal/privacy and IT hurdles in collecting complete data, and the implementation was subject to some friction.
Maar deze bedenkingen bleven beperkt tot de operationele laag. Over de bredere vraag — of dit allemaal wel verstandig, proportioneel of ethisch verantwoord was — hoorde je hem niet: "daar heb ik geen verstand van", was herhaaldelijk zijn ontwapenende maar ook veelzeggende verweer.
The neutral executor
Van Delden is the type of official who makes every great policy possible, regardless of the moral level: competent, loyal, focused on feasibility and efficiency. Once the train is moving, it doesn't ask too much about the destination or the tracks. That does not make it immoral, but it is characteristic of a system in which moral and substantive considerations remain far up in the hierarchy - in the Cabinet Quartet, the OMT and the Torentje - and the implementation layer is mainly asked to perform.
Hij illustreerde daarmee onbedoeld een structureel probleem van de Coronacrisis: de scheiding tussen zij die de beslissingen namen (en de morele verantwoordelijkheid droegen) en zij die ze moesten realiseren. Van Delden deed dat ogenschijnlijk zonder veel wrijving. Geen slapeloze nachten over bijwerkingen. Geen zorgen over oversterfte of de langetermijneffecten van een massale vaccinatiecampagne onder hoge tijdsdruk bij grote groepen gezonde mensen en jongeren voor wie de risico's van het virus statistisch verwaarloosbaar waren. Het was een logistieke uitdaging, niets meer en niets minder; en die heeft hij "naar eer en geweten" aangepakt.
Conclusion
In een crisis die zo diep ingreep in lichamelijke integriteit, vrijheden en maatschappelijke structuren, blijft de nuchtere efficiency van de projectmanager toch een ongemakkelijke spiegel: soms is de grootste tragedie niet de politieke fanatiekeling, maar de competente ambtenaar die gewoon zijn werk doet — zonder vragen te stellen naar het "waarom".
That is the core of Hannah Arendt's banality of evil. The contrast with Mona Keijzer is unavoidable: where she gave up her job because her conscience could no longer tolerate the policy, Van Delden implemented the same policy as if it were just another SAP implementation...
Marjolijn Sonnema 6 July 2026
Director General of Public Health at VWS
As DG Public Health, she was at the heart of the vaccination strategy and prioritization. Her interrogation was not a confession, but a defense of the official line, with a remarkably good selective memory and consistent loyalty to the political and medical top.
The one-sided consideration
Sonnema presented the vaccination order as a well-considered choice: priority for the most vulnerable elderly and healthcare staff based on the risk of a serious course and death. According to her, this was logical and ethically defensible. She acknowledged that the socio-economic Troika advocated a different (utilitarian) approach [how can society reopen as quickly as possible], but the advice of the Health Council (GR) remained leading. The order was therefore not determined by a broad social consideration. The relevance of a possible different prioritization did not seem to dawn on her and did not cause her to doubt for a second whether her choice was wise.
Exceptions (riot officers, embassy staff, Olympic athletes) in April 2021 were made ad hoc under political pressure because the numbers were small. According to her, lobbies played no further role; only the ME group was a real exception with more than 2,000 vaccines. Every other exception was firmly blocked.
Hugo de Jonge emerged from internal correspondence and Apps as ambitious and competitive — he wanted the highest vaccination rate in Europe. Sonnema mainly depicted him as someone who set high goals and listened carefully to official warnings.
What was striking was her repeated defense that the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport did not focus solely on medical matters. However, the reality that emerged from her own story was different: the GR line was followed, with a one-sided medical focus. Broad proportionality, social damage or utilitarian cost-benefit analyzes did not play any role. She pretended that a decision was being made, but in practice the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport followed the medical track - and Sonnema personally made a strong contribution to this with her warnings not to react too late and not to relax too early.
Loyalty and selective memory
She therefore warned against relaxing too quickly (together with the SG of AZ), while others wanted to open. On April 28, 2021, the cabinet went against the OMT advice. Later, the steps (fortunately) again followed the OMT advice.
Over de noodzakelijke wachttijd volgens de bijsluiter na het vaccin van Janssen was ze vaag (“dat weet ik oprecht niet meer”). Jongeren mochten direct na de prik weer de discotheek in (Dansen met Janssen), terwijl de bijsluiter een wekenlange inwerktijd voorschreef. Haar "selectieve geheugen" diende hier om de bewuste politieke fraude met de medische werkelijkheid (gedreven door De Jonges drang naar de "hoogste vaccinatiegraad") af te dekken
She did not think coercion or obligation was a good idea, although this was discussed internally, especially in the healthcare sector where the vaccination rate was considerably lower...
Her memory was selective: she remembered some operational details with clarity; it became foggy when it came to sensitive political or ethical choices. She consistently seemed to avoid getting her political bosses in trouble — a recurring pattern among top officials in interrogations.
The loyal insiders
Marjolijn Sonnema is intelligent and committed enough to know better, yet she continued to function within the system. As DG Public Health, where CBAs and broad considerations are normally the standard when choosing Health Insurance and the National Vaccination Program, she emphatically opted for the purely medical approach. Utilitarianism and proportionality were not discussed. She was the architect of the suspension of her own professional standards. She should have known how to weigh broad health damage; but in crisis mode she allowed the regular ethics of public health policy, based on cost/benefit analyzes with qalys, to be completely displaced.
She did not find the role of the NCTV in preparing packages of measures strange (given its coordinating role in crises), but it did underline how the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport itself did not always maintain control.
She thus illustrated a structural problem: within VWS, the focus remained de facto exclusively medical, while the broader damage to society, youth, economy and mental health was in fact not taken into account. The Rule of Rescue dominated, supported by models and assumptions (far too high IFR at the beginning of the Corona period, the exaggerated severity of Omikron at the end) that turned out to be largely based on quicksand. But she showed no reflection on that either, let alone any reservations about it.
Conclusion
Marjolijn Sonnema was the prototype of the loyal, competent top civil servant who served the system as it was designed. She actively contributed to maintaining the medical focus, while there was no broad consideration of interests.
In combination with the scientific shortcomings (aerosols, ventilation, models, excess mortality) that are still barely recognized, and certainly not by her, this makes the whole approach all the more bad.
Sonnema showed himself to be an insider who followed the set path and did not ask any fundamental questions.
A while ago, Jaap would probably have enjoyed working for the NS.
…just like just about every other average Dutch person, I'm afraid. It's actually not even about whether it was Jaap or Dirk. The System simply expects this from that function. We have fallen into a perilous trap of efficiency and laziness. Separation of actions and responsibility cannot go well.
Well, it is becoming increasingly clear how a social system and the resulting crisis policy are implemented. The executors are often loyal and obedient, ask few or no questions and follow along to fulfill their tasks. Not surprising in itself and perhaps even commendable in most cases, that's what they were appointed for. But… what if we are faced with situations and circumstances that are not standard, even exceptional? Can we expect that some critical capacity will always remain in force from every position involved? And that people feel there is a safe space to express themselves about this?
And we were/are dealing with such an exceptional situation. In the beginning everyone was robbed and it was good that they acted quickly. It soon became clear that there was a good chance we were dealing with a quite sickening virus (gain-of-function), which, however, (fortunately) did not turn out to be so sickening for everyone. For young people, for example. Moreover, it became clear early on that it really posed greater risks for only a few percent of the population. (more than a spicy flu like we occasionally have). That could have had a major impact on the vaccination rollout. The question then is whether vaccination was necessary for everyone... Then it is a pity that no critical voices have emerged from the policy and implementation chain. It is therefore extra commendable that Mona spoke out and Maurice remained so clear. How could that happen? Why are many so docile, sensitive to hierarchy, afraid of losing face or afraid of their skin? Falling in line is a way to hide behind and rely on your own duties. To avoid feeling guilty? Are we dealing with such a serious issue of conscience that can only be kept tolerable by shifting responsibility to each other? That explains the fogginess and partial memory loss of respondents. That is the social tenor. We all have to cover ourselves continuously. Perhaps quite understandable from a human point of view. Very sad for all of us.