The vast majority of people under 50 who catch CoV2 recovery completely with minimal symptoms. There is a trade-off and people need to be able to evaluate those risk and make those decision individually.
1. More than 5,000 people under 50 in a population of 66 million will have serious side effects from COVID.
2. In fact, nearly 3,000 people under 50 have already died from COVID in the UK.
3. This is despite only a small percentage of the population (3-10%) having been infected by COVID.
4. Even if you are under 50, and don't die to COVID, you are going to kill other people, by spreading it to them.
It's like driving drunk. It's personal risk AND risk to every other person around you.
When you do not vaccinate, and then go out and about, you are inflicting risk on immuno-compromised persons, for whom the vaccine doesn't work well.
Unless we lock anti-vaxxers in their homes, or unless we hold them criminally liable for infecting someone else, it's not a question of their personal risk.
Choosing to not get a vaccination primarily endangers you personally, but definitely also raises the danger level to those who have no choice in the matter.
> and make those decision individually
if you can somehow ensure people who get sick can't spread it, sure it's down to the individual, but it's a society-level problem. That's what "infectious" means.
The worst year of the Polio epidemic in the United States was 1952 where 3145 people died and about 21,000 had some level of lasting (but not necessarily permanent) health impact.
I personally don't think the state should mandate vaccinations by the way, even though such a mandate would almost definitely be a net good to society.