Aibu to be horrified at the thought of mandatory vaccinations

[TracyLords]

I’m not anti vax. I’ve had my jabs and will get booster this week.

There have been countries in the EU insisting on mandatory vaccination: this concerns me: surely it is up to the individual to decide to get vaccinated (or otherwise)

Some people seem to be concerned about the long term effects of vaccines, but never seem to specify what these effects might be.

What sort of long term effects are you worried about?

Can you give us an example of a long term effect resulting from a vaccine?

On balance, I’m more horrified at the people who are point blank refusing to have the vaccine. Total morons in my opinion. If making it mandatory is what it takes then perhaps a discussion in parliament is needed.

Making vaccines mandatory doesn't work. If you want to increase vaccination rates (and we already have high acceptance of vaccines in the UK) then you have to engage with the reasons for people not getting vaccinated. There has been a lot of work done in the populations that were hesitant about polio vaccination (and before that smallpox) that can be learnt from (hint: making vaccines mandatory hardens the anti-vax viewpoint). You need to make vaccines accessible (even on this thread people are saying they haven't had a jab they are entitled to and want because of the accessibility of the vaccines, they aren't anti-vaxers but they are not vaccinated), and you need to address any concerns.

Telling people they are wrong does not change minds and being allowed to refuse medical treatment is a right we should not give up lightly.

I'm pretty on board with the idea of charging people who refuse the vaccine with the money going to the health service, as per the Greece.

If you want to be an anti-science fuckwit, fine, but there is a cost to society. Only fair that is passed onto said fuckwit. I bet if they get hit in the pocket the vast majority will change their tune anyway.

@malificent7

Yanbu...a colleague is glad to have left Australia as apparently they are rounding up aboriginalsand forcing them to have the jab. 😵.Nazi Germany anyone?

Not actually true

The countries considering it already have mandatory vaccinations for other diseases.

Even the most fervent non-believer can surely work out that the info Holly the Hairdresser or Gary the Greengrocer has is hardly sound scientific advice?

We ALL are more likely to believe our friends and family who we trust have our best interests at heart over experts we don't know.

@malificent7

Yanbu...a colleague is glad to have left Australia as apparently they are rounding up aboriginalsand forcing them to have the jab. 😵.Nazi Germany anyone?

Not actually true.

Don't know why that posted in bold.

Come on though. This is so obviously bullshit you don't even need to spend 10 seconds confirming that it's bullshit with a simple google.

I wouldn't say it's horrifying. I'd say it's less than ideal and people should be able to decline. But we aren't in an ideal world are we?

Yanbu. But then I’ve not had a single covid jab so I would think that

(hint: making vaccines mandatory hardens the anti-vax viewpoint).

You'd think most adults would understand this but some people appear to think contempt and name calling are persuasive... if only...we'd have a 100% vaccination rate.

@MorningStarling

Great post.

As a general principle I am unhappy with the idea of mandatory vaccination but it’s true that the state does have the power to compel people to do things to protect overall population health: banning smoking in pubs is a good example.

Ultimately it comes down to whether you believe individuals have a right to do something which is potentially harmful to society at large.

In this instance I don’t believe that people’s right to avoid the vaccines for their own use trumps the right of our community not to be stuck in this endless cycle.

The “my body my choice” argument has been massively twisted to fit an anti science, anti intellectual agenda here.

Yanbu. I think some mumsnetters would be happy for the army to break through windows in the middle of the night, pin people down and vaccinate them. It's absolutely ridiculous. I've had my jabs but it should always be a choice.

YANBU, also not anti-vax/all for the covid jab, and even I'm sick of seeing the name calling directed at those who haven't taken the jab, which has also already happened on this thread.
In my opinion, the people wanting to force it on everyone and wanting to penalise those who refuse are just as bad as those refusing it because they believe there's a tracking chip in it, etc.

@VeronicaBeccabunga

Some people seem to be concerned about the long term effects of vaccines, but never seem to specify what these effects might be.

What sort of long term effects are you worried about?

Can you give us an example of a long term effect resulting from a vaccine?

Nobody would be able to give you the long term effects of an MRNA vaccine as it's the first time they've been used. There do seem do be a fair number of (hopefully very rare) short-term side effects that we do know about though, including pericarditis and myocarditis which has sadly led to deaths. Making vaccines mandatory when they can lead to death is highly immoral in my opinion, particularly when the vaccine companies are refusing to accept liability and they are still looking at the evidence for safety and efficacy.

[quote NollaigNollaig]@SheikhMaraca so just in case something may or may not happen in the future, your preference is that we don’t get our lives back and instead keep foundering away in this mess.

It doesn’t make sense. Look up about the plague. Entire towns shut themselves off no one allowed in or out. People did what they had to do to survive.[/quote]
Not at all, you’re presenting a false dichotomy between permanent lockdown, or vaccination.

I am suggesting having a grown up conversation about the fact that people die, and working towards acceptance of if the fact that the time in human history when we could all expect to live into our 80s and 90s, irrespective of pre-existing conditions, is sadly behind us.

Forcing healthy individuals to undergo a very new medical procedure in an attempt to hold back the tide is just an exercise in futility.

We need to accept the new normal, as difficult as that may be.

It shouldn't be mandatory. But anti vaxxers do then have to accept the knock on effects of not being able to travel, go to concerts, losing their job etc.

There's no such thing as an absolute right to do or not do something without any consequences if you live in a society where other people's rights also have to be considered.

I wouldn’t like to see it, but I’d like to see people who are unvaxxed from choice, not for any medical reason, excluded from a good many public places - restaurants, cinemas, hotels, etc.

I have a sneaking admiration for Singapore, where they’ve told the unvaxxed by choice that if they get COVID, they will be charged for hospital treatment. But then Singapore is notoriously tough in other ways,,too.

Double vaxxed here. Debating the booster. Absolutely against mandatory vaccines. I do not want to live in a society where it is punishable by law to not be injected with , what is still, a trial vaccine.

@SheikhMaraca unfortunately a grown up conversation isn’t going to stop hospitals being overwhelmed. Unless you’re saying the new normal is overwhelmed hospitals, delayed cancer diagnosis and treatment, delayed children’s procedures and other elective procedures? Or do you propose anyone with covid be left to die at home without medical assistance so the rest of the health system can function?

Both sound a lot scarier to me as a new normal than mandatory vaccination.

It’s not new any more. Billions of people have had the vaccine. And for the millionth time there aren’t long time side effects from vaccines.

If that's the case NollaigNollaig then why does this exist?

I don't think people should be forced to, but they equally should not expect to be able to get on a plane/be at large gatherings etc without having the vacc.

the state does have the power to compel people to do things to protect overall population health

Banning smoking is not the same as making vaccines mandatory; prevention and compulsion are opposites. It is not anti-science or anti-intellectual to say this. What is anti-intellectual is to not look at the evidence that already exists on how to increase vaccination rates but to repeatedly insist that making vaccinations mandatory is effective and necessary when there is no evidence to support that.

Some of the countries that are now considering compulsory vaccines are the ones that were hesitant themselves to start off with. In the UK we have no need for compulsion as the take up rate has been very high. In other countries it is much lower. You can’t really blame people for having fears of the vaccines and it is perhaps unfair to question their intelligence/critical skills when their own governments were offering what we would now call anti-vax arguments earlier in the year.