There has always been a segment of the population who oppose all vaccinations. Some people have religious objections to vaccination while others are simply paranoid. The number of people refusing vaccination was of little concern though, because most Canadians took part in vaccination programs. Herd immunity was attained and many diseases virtually vanished from the landscape. But, we are now seeing new outbreaks of diseases such as measles and whooping cough. Even polio is making a reappearance.Predictably, authoritarian-minded people are reacting destructively to the new outbreaks. Some are calling for crackdowns and forced vaccinations, while others are implying that people who refuse vaccinations should be denied medical care. They don’t understand that this very reaction fostered the mistrust in the establishment which led to the resurgence of old diseases in the first place.While COVID vaccination mandates have ended, we haven’t seen any retractions or apologies from medical authorities for wrongly imposing them upon people. Citizens were fed a bill of goods, and trust was shattered. If the state can’t admit it made mistakes or misrepresented the benefits or potential harms from the COVID vaccination mandates, why should people trust the state now?.When the vaccines for COVID appeared on the scene, we were told they would prevent transmission of the virus as other vaccines do. The untruth of that case quickly became evident, yet the authorities refused to back down on coerced vaccination. To have mandated vaccinations in any circumstance is an abhorrent attack on a person’s bodily autonomy. To maintain vaccine mandates when it's evident an unvaccinated person is no more likely to transmit the disease than a vaccinated one is much worse. Canadians learned that the state would rather die on the hill of misguided principle than back down on a policy. .Now, citizens are paying the price, as the shattered trust has led to people shunning inoculations that have proven benefits and safety records. I can’t wait for rabies to reappear on the scene. .When it was proven that healthy children were immune to the ill effects of COVID-19, schools remained closed anyway and it was illegal for children to go to a playground. A kid was brutalized by police in Calgary for the crime of ice skating and we never saw an apology. People can’t and won’t forget this soon. It has become clear that medical policies are more about control, than about protecting the health of the citizens. A relationship of trust must be rekindled with the state and it won’t come easily. Despite courts dropping charges against people who violated control mandates and despite lawsuits being won by people who lost their jobs over vaccination status, the government hasn’t done a single thing to ensure such things don’t happen again. We remain one viral outbreak away from another mass overreaction and the destruction of countless careers and relationships. In some sense, we got lucky with the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus was devastating for elderly and sickly people but overall, it wasn’t terribly dangerous relative to many diseases. The Spanish flu wiped out countless children and devastated the healthy. Imagine now if a disease as lethal as the Spanish flu or bubonic plague appeared on the scene. Gun-shy citizens would refuse vaccination or quarantine efforts much more vigorously than they did with COVID and the consequences will be devastating. We could be fortunate enough to have a vaccine for the new outbreak in short order, but could still see thousands die because people will refuse it. That sort of outcome will be the state’s fault, not that of the citizens who have been trained not to trust it. .Vaccines for the most part have been one of the most beneficial medical discoveries of modern times. We must try to encourage people to take part in inoculation programs for tried-and-true vaccinations. But, that encouragement must come through education and positive messaging. The gun-to-the-head approach through mandates and coercion only leads to reduced uptake with vaccinations. Let’s take one lesson from the COVID 19 debacle if nothing else. Drop the authoritarianism and respect the medical choices of citizens. Most will choose wisely when left to do so.
