A Defense of Compulsory Vaccination
HEC Forum 26 (1):5-25 (2014)
Abstract
Vaccine refusal harms and risks harming innocent bystanders. People are not entitled to harm innocents or to impose deadly risks on others, so in these cases there is nothing to be said for the right to refuse vaccination. Compulsory vaccination is therefore justified because non-vaccination can rightly be prohibited, just as other kinds of harmful and risky conduct are rightly prohibited. I develop an analogy to random gunfire to illustrate this point. Vaccine refusal, I argue, is morally similar to firing a weapon into the air and endangering innocent bystanders. By re-framing vaccine refusal as harmful and reckless conduct my aim is to shift the focus of the vaccine debate from non-vaccinators’ religious and refusal rights to everyone else’s rights against being infected with contagious illnesses. Religious freedom and rights of informed consent do not entitle non-vaccinators to harm innocent bystanders, and so coercive vaccination requirements are permissible for the sake of the potential victims of the anti-vaccine movementAuthor's Profile
DOI
10.1007/s10730-013-9221-5
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2013-08-17
Downloads
279 (#43,477)
6 months
12 (#77,635)
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Citations of this work
Good reasons to vaccinate: mandatory or payment for risk?Julian Savulescu - 2021 - Journal of Medical Ethics 47 (2):78-85.
A libertarian case for mandatory vaccination.Jason Brennan - 2018 - Journal of Medical Ethics 44 (1):37-43.
The moral obligation to be vaccinated: utilitarianism, contractualism, and collective easy rescue.Alberto Giubilini, Thomas Douglas & Julian Savulescu - 2018 - Medicine, Health Care and Philosophy 21 (4):547-560.
Vaccination, Risks, and Freedom: The Seat Belt Analogy.Alberto Giubilini & Julian Savulescu - forthcoming - Public Health Ethics:phz014.
The Ethics of Selective Mandatory Vaccination for COVID-19.Bridget M. Williams - 2022 - Public Health Ethics 15 (1):74-86.