In striking down the president’s ability to mandate the COVID-19 vaccine for U.S. government employees, a New Orleans federal appeals court has handed a victory to infectious disease.
Part of the court’s reasoning hinges on the argument that the decision to get vaccinated is a private medical decision unrelated to employment, as if viruses could be stopped at the door of federal buildings like lost tourists. In truth, whether or not to receive a COVID-19 vaccine is a choice that reverberates well beyond the individual, particularly in congregate settings such as workplaces.
It could well be argued that your employer, whether private or public, couldn’t force you to receive treatment for cancer or an autoimmune disease; those afflictions, terrible as they might be, can’t hurt others around you. Preventive measures against a highly contagious aggressive pathogen that is constantly evolving to become more infectious and more deadly and which can easily kill your coworkers — some, like older folks, much more readily than others — is an entirely different proposition.
