California anti-vax parents are having a tough week. Senate Bill 277 went into effect on July 1, barring unvaccinated children from public schools unless they have a medical exemption. Personal belief exemptions will no longer be allowed.
According to The Sacramento Bee, Scores of students without vaccine proof sent home on first day of school:
[pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Surely, if liberty is good for thee, it is equally good for me.[/pullquote]
In the Folsom Cordova Unified School District, 145 students out of about 3,200 starting kindergarten and seventh grade were sent home Tuesday on the first day of school for lack of immunization records …
A new state law that took effect July 1 eliminated personal- and religious-belief exemptions for families that opted to avoid vaccinations for their children. Under the new law, students entering the two checkpoint years of kindergarten and seventh grade are now required to show proof of vaccination…
Anti-vaxxers are appalled. It’s an issue of freedom! According to the Foundation for Economic Freedom, Mandatory Vaccinations Are Incompatible with Liberty.
Mandatory vaccinations involve a supreme violation of liberty, where agents of the state inject substances into someone’s body against his or her will. On the other side of the ledger, even in principle, mandatory vaccinations do not offer much benefit in enhanced public welfare, relative to a free society. When we throw in the realistic worries of government incompetence and malfeasance, the case against mandatory vaccinations is overwhelming.
And according to No on SB277, which opposed passage of the bill:
SB 277 eliminates a parent’s right to exempt their children from one, some, or all vaccines, a risk-laden medical procedure including death. In 2016, California parents will be forced to give their children more than 40 doses of 10 federally recommended vaccines. This open-ended vaccine mandate allows the State of California to add any additional vaccines they deem necessary at anytime. The only exemption available is a medical exemption that doctors deny to 99.99 percent of children under federal guidelines.
During their campaign opposing passage of the bill, they articulated a fundamental principle:
Where there is a risk of injury or death, no matter how small the perceived risk may be, there must be a choice.
I, too, am big believer in liberty. So anti-vaxxers, help me out. There’s something I don’t understand.
If you believe that you should be able to avoid vaccinating your children because you consider vaccines dangerous, shouldn’t everyone else in California be able avoid your unvaccinated children because they consider them dangerous?
Children who haven’t been vaccinated pose a risk because they can carry and spread vaccine preventable diseases.
How big a risk? That doesn’t matter, right? If it doesn’t matter how small the perceived risk of vaccines must be in order for you to refuse then, it shouldn’t matter how small the risk your unvaccinated children pose to their classmates, right. You insist there must be a choice.
The beauty of SB277 is that it allows you to exercise your right to protect your children from vaccines no matter how small the perceived risk may be and it allows the rest of us to exercise our right to ban your children from schools no matter how small the perceived risk may be.
Wait, what? You disagree??
Families that do not comply with the one-size-fits-all vaccine mandate, will lose their State Constitutional right for a free and appropriate education in public and private K-12 schools. The use of licensed daycare facilities, in-home daycare, public or private preschools and even after school care programs are also included in SB 277.
Duh! That’s the whole point of SB277. Since education is compulsory, without SB277 parents are forced to expose their children to the health threat of your unvaccinated children.
Any attempt by anti-vaxxers to force our children to be exposed to unvaccinated children is a violation of our liberty, right?
And surely, if liberty is good for thee, it is equally good for me.
