When there are large asymmetries (for example, in information or risk) regulation can be warranted. For example, most people feel regulating fissile material is prudent because the risk of it coming into the wrong hands is too high to just let unchecked freedom ring when it comes to owning it or not.
Legal adults, however, have a fundamental right to hurt themselves.
Yes, I know there are grey areas.
This is not true, any more than it is for vaccinated people.
Viruses will still spread through a fully-vaccinated population, and they will still mutate in a fully-vaccinated population.
The CDC released a report [1] showing proportional numbers of cases coming from fully vaccinated people (74% of cases against 69% of the population fully vaccinated).
Treating people who are not getting the vaccine as enemies is not going to convince us. In fact, this whole thing has made me, in particular, suspicious of other vaccines that I will research and make decisions for myself about.
[1]: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/pdfs/mm7031e2-H.pdf
One need only look at the overlay of cases and vaccination rates across different US states to show you’re just flat out wrong.
Similar manner to drink driving, sober people can also hurt others when driving.
This is about where we draw the line. When it comes to drink driving and antivaxxers they both endanger others to an unacceptably high level.
The tongue in cheek point I'm trying to make is that too much of the conversation focuses on relative risk. Relative risk obsession has people not taking more risky, but still incredibly safe (at least in the short term) vaccines here in Australia. Absolute risk (or its delta) tends to be a much more salient number to the victim.
It does help the antivaxx crowd in some circuitous arguments however, as the chance of an unvaccinated person killing a vaccinated person is low if vaccines work!
Also, calling people unvaccinated agency COVID anti-vaxxers, when most are not, is likely to lead to some becoming that.
You may have the personal freedom to get drunk—that doesn’t give you the freedom to drive around while under the influence and you endanger everyone else on the road.
The choice to be vaccinated or not is not a choice that affects merely the individual; its consequences affect communities. Regardless of whether it is valid or not to refuse vaccination, it is not solely within the realm of personal freedom and should not be treated that way.
The claim that unvaccinated people are a breeding ground for more effective versions of the virus sounds like a Big Pharma talking point, rather than something with solid science behind it. My understanding is that environmental pressure results in mutated variants becoming widespread. Couldn't vaccines themselves cause this? The virus hardly mutated for a whole year, but then once inoculations became available it seems that more infectious variants are popping up left and right.
1 person has no meaningful effect but collectively their actions are capable of doing great harm to the rest of us even if we all collectively act in our own best interests by getting vaccinated and participating in other public health measures.
If your freedom to act irrationally allows you to cause my untimely death I don't understand how my inability to go on living wouldn't represent a net decrease in freedom vs forcing you to vaccinate.
If you look at the break down of anti vaxxer sentiment only 9% are dead set against vaccination under any circumstances. These people's perception of their freedom isn't worth hurting everyone.
Mutations and variants occur all the time as the virus reproduces. Variants are not a response to any vaccine; they have appeared primarily (entirely? I haven't been following all of them) in regions where the vaccine is not yet widely available because that is where the virus is able to multiply (and thus mutate) the fastest.
Interesting theory though, I don't think it's true right now, but potentially there may be evidence I'm not aware of.
A real life/modern example of this can be found in Marek's disease in chickens. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marek%27s_disease#Prevention
The counter claim seems to be that because vaccination reduces the abundance of the virus there is a lower chance of mutations. It's hard to say which effect is stronger and it probably varies greatly by virus and by vaccine!
Disclaimer: I'm not an expert, just an armchair enthusiast.
“Vaccines that let the hosts survive but do not prevent the spread of the pathogen relax this selection, allowing the evolution of hotter pathogens to occur. This type of vaccine is often called a leaky vaccine.”
https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/jou...
Sometimes I think people confuse what they wish/think the government role should be with what is explicitly defined within the social contract between the government and the governed.