I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders
As I’m gettin’ older y’all people gets colder
Most of us only care about money makin’
Selfishness got us followin’ the wrong direction
Wrong information always shown by the media
Negative images is the main criteria
Infecting the young minds faster than bacteria

Where is the Love? Black eyed Peas 2009

A year ago, frontline medical staff were praised as heroes in their response to the Covid-19 pandemic, today those people in healthcare who choose not to have the Covid-19 vaccination are vilified as public health criminals. It is a sad day when someone like George Takei, a man I much admire, leads the attacks against these very people. He is not alone of course; others have launched scathing attacks against people exercising their human right to choose what medical procedures they undergo. They argue that it is a matter of public safety over personal choice, that the rights of the many outweigh the rights of the individual, but that can only be true if the public were in a situation of real danger, surely?

I have stated these facts repeatedly and they have not changed, but I will state them once again:
The mortality rate for Covid-19 is less than 2%
The recovery rate for Covid-19 is over 98%
Of the positive cases of Covid-19 0.4% are serious or critical
Of the positive cases of Covid-19 99.6% are mild only https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

These figures support the British Government’s decision to declassify Covid-19 as a High Consequence Infectious Disease (HCID) on 19 March 2021, which was the day before the first national lockdown in the United Kingdom.

In Britain the vaccines issued in response to the pandemic approved using Regulation 174 of the Human Medicine Regulations 2012. This enables rapid temporary regulatory approvals to address significant public health issues such as a pandemic. This temporary licence still applies today and has not yet been replaced by a permanent licence.

A person inoculated with a Covid-19 vaccine can still contract and transmit the virus.
However, my real point in this piece is not the facts concerning Covid-19, it is how quickly people fall on others. As a species we appear to turn to hate at the drop of a hat. It really does not matter what the cause is, disability, sexual orientation, race, creed, age, freedom of choice, time and again a large proportion of society jumps to actively discriminate against another group irrespective of the facts concerning the matter and, as the Black Eyed Peas also observed in their song:

And to discriminate only generates hate
And when you hate then you’re bound to get irate
Madness is what you demonstrate
And that’s exactly how hate works and operates
Man, we gotta set it straight

Hate is what I see in this subject of the pandemic. Hate narrows opinion and closes the forum of reasoned discussion. It always become a ‘if you’re not with us you’re against us’ scenario, which for some is also a divide and conquer situation.

On the question of public safety as a justification for removing people’s right to work, if Covid-19 was as dangerous as Yellow Fever, which has a mortality rate of up to 50%, and a vaccine as efficient as that given to protect people from Yellow Fever, which provides immunity for +99% of those inoculated, then there would be a definite moral argument to support the need to enforce people to have the vaccine; but that is not the case as proven above. A vague claim to ‘public safety’ is made time and again to support the removal another person’s right to employment, but it is never supported with evidence that proves forced inoculation with the Covid-19 vaccine will ensure the safety of anyone.

The same grounds have been used to limit the freedoms of people in respect of attending venues or travelling. The creation of a two-tier system of freedom is apparent, but the people driving towards this system do not see the logical consequence of their actions. They still believe that they and everyone else live in a free world that respects their rights, it is just that those who have not been vaccinated chose to surrender some of their rights, which is patently untrue; they simply resisted the coercion to conform that was exerted against them.

In Britain we have the Public Health Act 1984 that specifically states that members of the public should not be compelled to undergo any mandatory medical treatment, including vaccinations. Despite the existence of this law the British Government are pressing ahead to make Covid-19 vaccinations mandatory for workers in the healthcare profession. The first case to challenge this decision cannot be far away, unions are urging staff not to resign but wait to be sacked so that a complaint of wrongful dismissal can be brought. It is saddening that it will take a legal case to decide whether people still have a right that is already protected by law.