Posted on by Californiacontrarian

Enticement vs. Coercion

Many times in the past I have said, “often there can be a fine line between  courage and craziness or likewise between brave behavior and foolish behavior.” For example, running into a burning building to save a cat … brave and courageous or foolish? Or for those cat-lovers out there – consider the “daring”, or perhaps I should say “dumb” exploits of Evel Knievel. Need I say more?

I bring up the concept of “a fine line” as a lead-in to the controversial topic of mandating Covid vaccinations, as here there appears to be an expanding fine line between enticement and coercion.

Right from the git-go, I want to be clear that I am far, far from being an anti-vaxxer. I grew up in the polio era, and it was scary … “you can’t go to the neighborhood pool, you’ll get polio.” My kids have always gotten their vaccines. I have gotten all of my vaccines through adulthood. I have had a flu-shot every year for about the last fifty years. I was one of the first to stand in long lines to get my Moderna Covid vaccine, and, yes, I have gotten both shots. Why? Simple. I am in the high risk group for Covid. According to the CDC, when compared to 5-17 year olds, I am 3500X more likely to die and 65X more likely to be hospitalized if I get Covid. Furthermore, if I were to get Covid, my chance of dying from it is 0.8% (8.2 out of 100,000) compared to a 0.0002% risk of dying in the 5-14 year old age group, and a 0.0015% risk in the 15-24 year old age group.

With that background I will now address the main thrust of this essay: Namely, “should Americans be coerced into getting a Covid vaccine.” 

At this point, 73.7% of the population of over-65 Americans have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19, and 85.2% have had at least one dose. Recall that these are the most medically vulnerable to the ravages of the virus.

From my perspective, private businesses can probably do whatever they wish, at least until some court rules on it. This is a business decision. Will requiring proof of vaccination, let’s say to go to a restaurant, or to board a plane, lead to more customers or less customers? Certain states have offered enticements to encourage people in that state to get vaccinated. Although I view this as a ridiculous waste of taxpayer money, nobody is coercing anybody to get the vaccine if they do not want to get it. BTW, the reason that those individuals are choosing not to be vaccinated is totally irrelevant. 

What about those who have already had Covid? Should they be coerced or even enticed to get the vaccine? Is there any proof one way or the other? Senator Rand Paul (R, KE) has had Covid, and says that at this point he will not be getting the vaccine unless new data shows that it would be beneficial for him.

What about middle-school and high school students? Should they be coerced or even enticed to get vaccinated? (It is important to note here that requiring a Covid vaccination is much different from requiring DPT shots to attend school, as at this point no one knows what the benefits vs. the long term potential side-effects of the Covid vaccinations are.)  Despite the fact that the statistics show that this young age group is at minuscule risk from Covid, I have it on good authority that some school districts in Massachusetts will be requiring (coercing) students to be vaccinated come the beginning of the next school year. As best I can tell, being able to go to a public school is one of the benefits of living in the U.S.A. If a school district can mandate (coerce) its students to be vaccinated for Covid, will they next be mandating that students cannot bring any meat to school in their homemade lunches?

To paraphrase Ronald Reagan … “Whenever you hear, ‘But it’s for your own good,’ …  be very very wary.”

6/19/21

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