We will look back on COVID as a time when we had to pick sides. Do you support vaccine mandates? Or do you oppose them? You must choose your position on principle, for or against.
This confuses policy with morality. It makes any change immoral, by definition.
There is a better way.
A Prudent Approach To Vaccine Mandates
Here’s a short piece I wrote for The Hub, which suggests prudence instead of principle. You can read the first part below, or click on the link to take you to the full article right away.
Enjoy!
Shawn Whatley: Why we need a flexible, prudent approach to vaccine mandates
Pandemics create fear, and fear extinguishes appetite for balanced discussion. Instead, governments take bold, expansive action. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s “sweeping federal vaccine mandate” to “target last holdouts” offers a case in point. The public supports vaccine travel passports, but broad mandates fuelled by emotional rhetoric create affective polarization: partisan groups with anger and frustration on each side.
To date, most discussion on vaccine mandates reflects a principled approach. People must choose a side, for or against. Some argue mandates are a necessarily good thing; mandates will get us back to normal; and they serve the greater good. Others argue mandates are intrinsically bad. They insult individual autonomy—the greatest good any country can ever get.
But a principled approach turns policy positions into moral absolutes. If mandates are good on principle, there should be no limit to their scope. We should pursue them with vigour for all the various diseases for which we have vaccines. Restrictions to freedom of movement “should be tailored to verifiable risk,” according to one opinion in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Prudence offers a better way to craft policy. It avoids turning policy into morality. Prudence uses current circumstance to create policy, in the same way we might choose to carry an umbrella if the sky looks grey. Prudence applies general principles, with nuance, based on the particular need at hand. It makes policy flexible and responsive—something pandemic policy too often lacks.
Michelle Mello, Ross Silverman, and Saad Omer tackled this concept in an article that appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine. They suggested guidelines for mandates based on experience in other infections and pandemics: the 1976 Swine Flu, H1N1, and others. Using past experience, they suggested a five-level rubric to help policy-makers decide whether or not we need vaccine mandates at this time. … (Continues here)
Photo credit CBC article: Trudeau says post-election priority is vaccine mandate for public servants, travellers
If only governments and its bureaucracies, in particular its health care bureaucracy , exhibited such prudence with “ Primum non nocere” as their guiding light.
Instead we have witnessed pride, conceit and arrogance on a global scale…the Chief Medical Advisor to the US President comes to mind.
“Pride, conceit and arrogance on a global scale … ”
Well said indeed.
They paint themselves into a corner, then change the rules to get out of the corner, then wonder why the public doubts their competence.
Thanks so much for posting a comment!
cheers
Hard working, ethical physicians are being lumped in with their bureaucratic colleagues. As a member of the general public, I fear following the dictates of our provincial governing bodies is leading us to a place we don’t want to be medically, ethically and spiritually.
Thank Bob
You make a good point about where we want to be as a society. Do we want to become more uniform, more regulated, and if so, by whom? Do we want to become more wild, more uncivilized, and if so, on whose terms?
Too few of us ask where decisions lead us or how they change who we are.
Thanks so much for taking time to read and post a comment!
Cheers
Maybe your best piece ever Shawn.
In complete agreement.
I have been disturbed by the glee demonstrated by the woke left in restrictions/mandates imposed during this pandemic,with the concept spilling over into the election.
Western societies seem not to comprehend the ramifications of removing individual freedoms.Its almost as if the left is using the pandemic experimentally,to see how far they can push socialist philosophy…..make no mistake that the pandemic has been usurped to push political boundaries.
It will be interesting to see if we can spin out of this vortex ….
Wow … thanks, Ram!
I agree, extremism and enthusiasm seem to be on sale over the last couple years. People are weaponizing generally accepted ideas (e.g., don’t hurt people, treat everyone with respect) to advance their own niche activist agenda.
And sorry I missed this comment (didn’t get notified for some reason).
Thanks for reading and posting a comment. Cheers
Serving the public has always been an incidental responsibility for politicians whose primary purpose is to get re-elected. The total abject failure by virtually all governments in how they handled the pandemic is what stands out for me. The autopsy/audit of the governmental management of this pandemic, if a truly honest one will ever be done, may well be more interesting than the pandemic itself. It is more likely that a cover up type report will ensue in the form of a sanctimonious and self-flaggelating document praising themselves. The more honest assessment will sadly only surface perhaps many years later in the future when legacy media eventually(I’m being hopeful and optimistic) returns to their roots as being the “guardians of justice”. How strange that those that lead us constantly demand a less patriarchal society while adopting a patriarchal and quasi-dictatorial approach in imposing dictates on the public during this pandemic. “Prudence” is not in their lexicon.
Excellent comments, Dr. Kwan!
I tried to pick one line to say I liked more than all the rest but there are too many! “How strange that those that lead us constantly demand a less patriarchal society while adopting a patriarchal and quasi-dictatorial approach in imposing dictates on the public during this pandemic.”
Thanks for taking time to read and post!
Cheers