1. Everyone has the right to deny being treated without stigmatization or punishment.
2. Everything the article depends on in its interpretation of the chart, mostly summarized by the 2nd paragraph, is based on unwarranted assumptions.
2. Everything the article depends on in its interpretation of the chart, mostly summarized by the 2nd paragraph, is based on unwarranted assumptions.
The first part of this sentence is OK, the second part is not.
For basically all of history, quarantine -- backed up by the threat of deadly force if necessary -- has been an accepted feature of civilization, since allowing an untreated carrier of infectious disease into a population has impacts beyond just that one person's health.
Or, more simply: sure, you can have a right to refuse treatment. And everyone else can have a basic right to defend themselves from you when that refusal poses a threat to their own health.
It is the acceptance of corporate tyranny, that seems to becoming the norm in first world nations, which is truly alarming. Do people really understand what it would mean to have mandatory vaccinations? Not only would it not stop all cases of any of these diseases, but pharmaceutical companies would be falling over themselves to create more and more marginally effective vaccines to add to an already large list. And prices would go through the roof. Be careful not to make the prefect the enemy of the good.
Exceptionally bad comparison. If I have measles, I can infect dozens of other people in a matter of days without realising it, by walking around, in places and situations in which these people have every expectation of not being at increased risk. Once I know I have measles, I know I am a walking dispensary of disease and can expect to infect other people just be walking around near them, sneezing and coughing and touching things. If I get quarantined (and don't die), a week or so later I'm clean.
If I have HIV, I cannot infect dozens of people by walking around with it. Other people would have to be exceptionally unlucky to catch it from me, or be deliberating engaging in known unsafe practices. If I know I have it, I could take a few extra precautions myself and have every expectation of never infecting anyone. If I get quarantined, I'm there until I die. Decades maybe. That's not quarantine; that's life without parole.
- measles killed millions
- we already have "mandatory" vaccines -- you're theoretically required to have them to go to school. And yes, some have criticized the expansion of that list.
- but a much more common criticism of drug companies is that they're not researching vaccines and cures -- it's much more profitable to sell a pill that you take every day than it is to sell something that you take once a lifetime.
This is one of our biggest problems these days. You do have the right to self-determination. Others have the right to stigmatize you, especially if your choices impact others! If my house is a dangerous mess, should I be surprised when my friends and neighbors avoid me?
Freedom is a two-way street.