On the Need for an Association for Vaccinated Person’s Rights
COVID-19 has been more difficult to contain in the United States than in other countries due, in part, to our nation’s rootedness in preserving individual freedoms, sometimes in defiance of the need for social accountability for health. With growing evidence that anti-vaccination proponents are increasingly organized, funded, and influential, this editorial argues that the right to health should transcend individual freedoms that have a likely probability of spreading harm to others. An association for vaccinated person’s rights, much like ANSR, an association for non-smokers rights, may be needed to counter anti-vaccination rights organizers. Advancing a goal of mostly “vaccinated and fully immunized populations’ would make members of such a group ‘VIP-ers.’”