2020 has gone from being an all bad news year, to what I guess can be described as a good news/bad news kind of year.
The good news? We have several very promising vaccines that should be available fairly soon – in fact in record time. The bad news is that public distrust about the safety and efficacy of the vaccine is surprisingly widespread; and it’s particularly high among African-Americans, according to NPR. Three former presidents- Clinton, Bush and Obama- have all volunteered to receive the vaccine live in order to reassure the public over its safety.
Just last year before the pandemic hit there was a lot of discussion about the problems that have arisen as a result of the decisions by so-called “anti vaxxers-” those who refuse to take vaccines or have them administered to their children for either religious reasons or because they doubt the veracity of the science behind them. I don’t need to make a lengthy case that such beliefs fly in the face of reality, so I won’t. If you think vaccines cause autism you’re just dead wrong.
And yet as Ron Bailey over at Reason has adroitly noted – vaccines don’t in and of themselves solve the problem unless the vaccinations are widespread enough to help achieve herd immunity. Public officials have to convince the public that the vaccine is effective in helping to solve the pandemic and safe. As I have noted elsewhere, at the moment public trust in our political leadership is not especially high, for good reasons.
So what should a liberty-minded person think about the role that the state should play in getting the public as widely vaccinated as soon as possible? Initially, one might believe that a libertarian would make this an individual decision – a person has the right to decide to do what she sees as best. However, libertarians and liberty-minded individuals also very much believe in John Stuart Mill’s “harm principle”. The harm principle states that the only reason to restrict the actions of individuals is to prevent harm to others. By not getting vaccinated individuals make hitting the herd immunity threshold a longer and more difficult goal to achieve, putting others directly at risk.
So for those of us who defend the concept of liberty, vaccines seem to be an example where perhaps the state can and should use its coercive power to force citizens to be vaccinated, assuming the vaccine is deemed safe and effective. While this runs contrary to the intuition one might expect, individuals who reject the vaccine are obviously violating the harm principle.
Should those of us who defend liberty endorse the idea that the state should set up mandatory vaccination clinics and drag people out of their homes in the night to vaccinate them? Obviously not. But just as schools require children to be vaccinated before attending, it seems to me that requiring a COVID vaccine for certain activities is a way to “encourage” such behavior. One might even use the rather unpopular word “nudge”. Want a driver’s license? Show me your COVID vaccination. Care to enter a public building? You need to document you’ve been vaccinated. Private businesses should take the same steps. I would much rather peacefully and comfortably comb the aisles of Walmart and Costco without a mask but with my vaccination certificate.
Freedom and responsibility are tied at the hip, and we are at the point where we must individually agree to act swiftly and responsibly to help save lives – let’s get vaccinated as soon as possible and save the lives of others. But let’s also accept that we must allow for the prospect that the state might have a role to play here. If cigarettes are regulated because of the risk of secondhand smoke, encouraging COVID vaccination seems like a no-brainer.
READER COMMENTS
robc
Dec 4 2020 at 4:31pm
Not getting the vaccine doesn’t harm others, unless you happen to get it and then pass it on. And that is the action that harms others, it isnt the not getting the vaccine. And we havent mandated the flu vaccine, and that kills too.
And is there really any reason for anyone healthy under age 60 to get it? I could see me getting it, I am 51, so maybe I am getting to the range to worry a bit. I got the shingles vaccine just before covid hit, so maybe I need this one too. Maybe. But I can’t think of any good reason to risk a new vaccine on my 4 year old. If covid is still a worry, she can get it when she is 50. I figure by next fall it will be included with the standard annual flu vaccine, so we will all get it then anyway.
Alan Goldhammer
Dec 4 2020 at 5:43pm
Lots of people under the age of 60 years old get hospitalized for COVID-19. Isn’t that reason enough? Look at how hospitals in hot COVID-19 zones are overcrowded and healthcare workers are sometimes working 36 hour shifts. I’m sorry to be blunt, but this statement is just stupid.
robc
Dec 4 2020 at 6:34pm
So, exactly like the flu? Only less so for the young? I have been getting the flu shot for about 7 years now, so if it gets included in annual flu I wont refuse it. But dont see a reason to go out of my way before next October.
Thomas Hutcheson
Dec 4 2020 at 8:13pm
The reason for you to get the vaccine is to reduce the risk that you will get the virus and pass it oooooon to someone else. The chances of your child transmitting the disease is pretty low, so that is probably an ok decision.
Jon Murphy
Dec 5 2020 at 10:53am
Off the top of my head:
-People who interact with high-risk groups
-People who regularly interact with large groups of people (ie teachers)
-People who figure the costs are less than the benefits
Laron
Dec 4 2020 at 4:56pm
I don’t necessarily disagree with your analysis here, but the second-to-last paragraph describing private actions seems like a fairly effective argument against the forced state intervention described in the paragraph right above it, no?
MarkG
Dec 4 2020 at 6:04pm
When you find yourself advocating a forced medical procedure, perhaps it is time to step back and take wider view of the situation.
If this rushed vaccine really is as effective and without side-effects as expected that is well and good (and I’ll eat my hat if this is shown to be the case after a year or two for the evidence to become clear). But it is not the ONLY solution to the COVID problem, merely the only one being actively promoted. There are several other solutions that have been repeatedly proven to prevent AND help with the recovery from COVID illness – the latter something the vaccine CANNOT do!
So step back a bit, have a look around, and ask serious questions about this magic bullet that people are lining up to swallow hook, line, and sinker. You know it won’t end with this one.
Muhammad M Rashid
Dec 4 2020 at 6:45pm
This is a great article and exposes both the strengths and the weakness of Natural Law Theorists and Positive Law Theorist.
Natural Law theorists are a majority and hence, use principles in the making of legal decisions.
Mills principal of harm is one such principle, and we see how this principle raises questions in regards to liberty.
Furthermore, this problem also brings to light Isaiah Berlins two concepts of liberty. Hence, positive liberty and negative liberty.
Mark Brophy
Dec 4 2020 at 9:34pm
We don’t need a vaccine for a disease with a 99.8% survival rate. Let the vulnerable have their vaccine and leave the rest of us alone. If there were a large mnarket and sufficient demand for a vaccine, it wouldn’t have been necessary for the government to fund development of vaccines.
Jon Murphy
Dec 5 2020 at 10:51am
The harm principle is a necessary, but not sufficient, reason for government intervention. One of the problems we run into is that harm is reciprocal. To prevent harm on A, the government must necessarily inflict harm on B (and vice versa). Further, there’s the question of how much government interventions will be abused. Already there’s discussion of forbidding people from traveling via air who do not have COVID vaccine certificates.
Government certainly has a role, but we must be very careful in discussions about what that role is. That’s why I reject an axiomatic approach to politics like Mill’s.
Hugh Cassidy
Dec 5 2020 at 11:57am
“The bad news is that public distrust about the safety and efficacy of the vaccine is surprisingly widespread;”
People are distrustful of a new vaccine with limited testing. Why is this bad news? And why would you find this surprising?
andy
Dec 7 2020 at 3:05am
The no harm principle is not obvious in this case as the harm is not a result of an intent. We could preventively jail some people based on their psychological profile with the reasoning that there is some probability that under some circumstances (alone in a dark alley, catching virus) they would cause harm.
In a society that is based on respect of individual rights we do not do certain things. This means that we may not achieve some ends the collectivist societies can. Decisions have costs. This is just a cost. We may well decide to bear it.
Knut P. Heen
Dec 7 2020 at 8:14am
There are two types of harms possible here. Type 1 is the herd immunity argument. My understanding is that at least some of the vaccines may have only a private effect. These vaccines reduces the consequences of getting the virus (less severe outcome), but does not stop you from infecting others.
Type 2 is the side-effect argument. We do not know the long-term side-effects. Suppose x percent of the population ends up on welfare (or some kind of disability insurance) after taking the vaccine. These people also harms others by living off others because they took the vaccine.
Now, if a vaccine do not produce herd immunity but may produce side-effects, would not discouraging vaccination be a no-brainer?
My point is that any decision involving trade-offs can never be a no-brainer. At the moment, we do not know that any vaccine will prevent spreading of the virus and we only know of no serious short-term side-effects. In the short-term, smoking does not kill you either.
Diego Alvarado
Dec 16 2020 at 9:28am
The fact that all of these are being released with emergency clearance from the government for the FDA. Not all but the most “effective” vaccines include cell mutating RNA . These are experimental drugs being released with no data on what the long term and multi generational affects are. This is for a virus that kills less people than the flu. How about we demand how many of the actual deaths being reported are caused by Covid. There has to be proper reporting and documentation. 99.97% chance of being fatal for the average person does not constitute breaking and defying anybody’s liberties. People need as much solid reliable data to make an informed decision. Since the beginning of all this in March it has been widespread disinformation and purposefully I feel.. to help divide opinions. I’m sorry but the way the author speaks of ” nudging” people!…sickening. That is thinly veiled if not outright tyranny and harassment of people just trying to go about daily life. Also distrust of the government is not something hanging around from the previous 4 yrs. In the history of the world ..this is fact….no government has ever had the interest and safety of the people it governs as its priority. By the way …herd immunity is natural occurring and does not need a vaccine to take affect. The widespread lack of critically thinking and common sense these days is most concerning to me though….and NO I am not and never been a Trump supporter just an individual thought supporter.
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