Why refusing the COVID-19 vaccine isn’t just immoral – it’s ‘un-American’

  Decades ago, I helped organize a conference that brought together vaccine skeptics and public health officials. The debate centered on what governments can and cannot demand from citizens, and what behaviors one can rightly expect from others.

  It took place many years before the current coronavirus pandemic, but many things that happened at that conference remind me of our circumstances today. Not least, as a political theorist who also studies social ethics, it reminds me that arguments grounded in self-interest can often be correct – but still deeply inadequate.

US is split between the vaccinated and unvaccinated – and deaths and hospitalizations reflect this divide

  In recent weeks, one piece of data has gotten a lot of attention: 99.5% of all the people dying from COVID-19 in the U.S. are unvaccinated.

  We are two researchers who work in public health and study immunity, viruses, and other microbes. Since the start of the pandemic, public health experts have been concerned about what might happen if large sections of the U.S. population, for whatever reason, did not get vaccinated. Over the past few weeks, the answer to that question is starting to emerge.

Could employers and states mandate COVID-19 vaccinations? Here’s what the courts have ruled

  A safe and effective vaccine could end the coronavirus pandemic, but for it to succeed, enough people will have to get inoculated.

  Recent polls suggest that the U.S. is far from ready. Most surveys have found that only about two-thirds of adults say they would probably get the vaccine. While that might protect most people who get vaccinated, research suggests it may be insufficient to reach herd immunity and stop the virus’s spread.