A Discourse on Popular Mask, Vaccine Arguments

As the US exits the COVID 19 pandemic, a new set of public policy questions arise. To start, this essay will outline arguments and counter arguments for three topics. Compulsory mask wearing, wearing masks after the pandemic has ended, and vaccine privacy. After that, this essay will discuss the nexus of proposed policies and some consequences of their being enacted.

1. Vaccine Privacy

Millions of Americans are currently receiving the COVID-19 vaccines in hopes that they will halt, and hopefully eradicate the virus. While some Americans are excited and willing to receive their shots, others are hesitant to partake in the mass rollout. While some fears of the vaccines are deluded or conspiratorial, there are legitimate reasons for the average person to opt out of getting the shots. The strongest argument for not receiving the vaccines is that we simply do not understand the long-term health effects of these vaccines. To be blunt, the technology utilized by these new vaccines is novel and untested. They have not been approved by the FDA, and have instead been granted an Emergency Use Authorization. To put it another way, those who take these vaccines are essentially part of a mass drug trial. While it may be the case that these vaccines are safe and effective in the long run, we simply do not have the data to buttress such a conclusion. The human immune system is an incredibly complex system, and the consequences of intervening in the immune system at such a large scale are unknowable, and it is for this reason that a rational person might opt out of the vaccine rollout.

Given that some people can reasonably opt out of the vaccines, it is clear that vaccinated, and unvaccinated individuals will soon be interacting at a large scale, as states begin to ease there economic restrictions. This raises fears that interacting with unvaccinated people will be dangerous. Since interacting with unvaccinated people could be dangerous, it has been argued that an individual’s vaccine status should be public information. We make information about potentially dangerous individuals public in other instances; such as if an individual is a sex offender or a felon. Vaccination status is clearly different from these situations though, because vaccine status is medical information. Since vaccination status is medical information, and it stands to reason that medical information should be shared between individuals, their doctors, and whomever else the patient decides ought to know such information, there is at least some reason to think that mandating vaccine status be public violates a basic right to privacy. It is doubtful that we would mandate that most other types of health status be public information, so it’s hard to see why vaccine status should be any different.

The proponents for “status publicity” could argue that vaccine status is a particular case of medical information that should be public because it is medical information which affects other people. There are a few problems with this line of argument. First, it is dubious whether or not vaccine status “affects other people” or not. Whether or not vaccine status affects other people depends chiefly on whether or not the vaccine prevents you from spreading, or contracting the virus. At this point, it is unclear whether or not the vaccines operate in this way. To my knowledge, although data is changing everyday, it appears that the vaccines attenuate the symptoms of COVID 19, but may not prevent the individual from spreading or contracting the disease in the first place. If the vaccines do not prevent you from spreading or contracting the virus, then an individual’s vaccine status has no effect on others, which means that it would make no sense to mandate vaccine status as public information on the grounds that it affects others.

For argument’s sake, we’ll grant that the vaccines do in fact prevent individuals from spreading and contracting the virus. In this case, it still doesn’t make sense for vaccine status to be public. Then, from the point of view of a vaccinated individual, interacting with an unvaccinated individual is not dangerous on the grounds that you cannot contract COVID from them. From the point of view of unvaccinated individuals, interacting with other unvaccinated individuals could be dangerous. In this case, it would be reasonable for a particularly risk-averse individual to want to know another’s vaccine status. But just because it would be reasonable for an individual to want another’s personal information, does not mean that the former can demand that information be publicized from the latter. It is reasonable for a banker to want your social security number to set up a bank account, but it doesn’t make sense for him to demand you make your social security number public as a consequence. Thus, it would make sense, in this case, for unvaccinated people to ask others privately about their vaccine status if they were concerned enough about contracting the virus to care. The person being asked still has the right to refuse the information, and it is at this point that the concerned individual can use their agency to determine whether or not they want to continue the interaction. There is nothing wrong with individuals privately sharing this information consensually with one another, but that is a far cry from vaccine status being “public”. In addition, if an individual is so concerned about contracting the virus, it would be more rational for they themselves to get the vaccine rather than demand everyone else’s vaccine status. Now of course, there are some other medical reasons that preclude an individual from receiving a vaccine, but this seems to be yet another reason why this information should be private, as it is inevitable that other indisputably private information that is tangential to vaccine status will be made public as well.

2. Mask Wearing

As the pandemic comes to a close, states are lifting their mask mandates. Though the medical establishment has made it clear that the need for masks is waning, there are still some who think that we ought to remain masked despite there being no public health benefits. First off, if someone wants to continue to wear a mask despite the pandemic ending, there is nothing wrong with that. It may be foolish, and even hurtful to that individual but they have the right to put whatever garment on their body as they please. The problem though is the individuals who continue to demand that others stay masked after the pandemic comes to a close.

Those making these kinds of demands might make them on the grounds that others not wearing masks put the demander at risk. But at a certain point, the risk of the virus becomes so negligible that the societal, and psychological ramifications of mask wearing far outweigh their benefits. There are plenty of things that others do that put us at an increased risk. For example, driving a car puts yourself, and everyone else on or near the road at more risk than if there were no cars at all, but we accept that risk for the reason that we gain other goods by taking that risk. By having a society that drives, we save time, can live further from our work, can travel further more easily etc. Now of course, an individual cannot just drive however they want. They must follow the speed limit, drive in the lanes on the road, and drive on the correct side of the road. We have these rules to minimize the risk of driving as much as we can without losing the benefits. To bring this analogy back to public health, it makes sense that we all do things like wash our hands, and cover our mouths when we sneeze (this is like driving the speed limit, or using your turn signal). These are extremely low cost procedures which do a lot to protect each other and ourselves from unnecessary risk. Mandating masks after the pandemic ends though, is more akin to lowering all the speed limits to 15 miles per hour, and making every road one lane. Yes, the risk of driving is nearly gone, but we’ve lost all the benefits as well. Sure, wearing a mask might make you marginally less likely to spread or contract an illness, but there are all sorts of goods you miss out on as a consequence. While each individual is able to make this choice for themselves, it is nearly certain that the risk of catching an illness in exchange for the limitless beauty of uninhibited human interaction is one worth taking.

Those advocating for mask mandates after the pandemic may do so on the grounds that those mandates are no different from laws which require us to wear any other type of clothing. This argument is wrong on the grounds that a mask requirement is clearly not akin to laws that require us to wear shoes or shirts in public. For one, the human face is one of, if not the most important facet of human communication. The interaction between facial expression, tone of voice, and body posture all combine in extremely complicated ways in order to convey all the depth in human thought and emotion. Wearing shoes, pants, or blouses simply do not burden our communicative abilities in this way. The face is by far the most individualized part of any person, and to obstruct it is to destroy the marvelous nuance which nature has adorned our species. Think of a specific person, and you will not think of their feet, or their chest, but you will imagine their face.

Even if masks were just like any other garment (which they are not) it would still not stand to reason that people should be forced to wear them. People have the right to adorn their bodies with or without whatever they please. A counter argument to this position may be that holding it would mean that all laws mandating clothing are unjust; and this may very well be the case. Being committed to such a position is a small price to pay for the wonder in seeing the smiles of strangers.

The last problem with mask mandates is a basic problem of rights and liberties. On one side, you have a set of people demanding that everyone follow their rules. On the other, you have a set of people advocating that everyone be allowed to make their own decisions. A free and open society is predicated on the right to self governance and individual autonomy. If someone want’s to wear a mask after the pandemic is done, fine, but don’t force others to conform to your view.

3. The Nexus of Mask Wearing, Vaccine Status

The last discussion in this essay is going to center around proposed policy that unvaccinated people should have to continue to wear masks until they are vaccinated. This proposal is one of the most thoughtless, and illiberal proposals made in popular discourse in recent memory. It shows a complete lack of careful thought on the subject, and a brazen historical ignorance. Vaccines and masks are some of the most politically charged and divisive topics in American politics, maybe ever. It has already been discussed in this essay that there are good reasons to opt out of vaccination, but it is not uncommon to hear the notion that people who don’t want to get vaccines are bad people, who want others to die, who want others to get sick, who don’t care about others, etc. To say the least, there is a palpable hatred for people who are vaccine hesitant, in what might be a small, but still very vocal minority of people. During the pandemic it has not been uncommon to see people verbally or physically attacked for not complying with mandates. Large segments of the public have had their senses distorted by fear and anger, and have so been lead to say and do unthinkable things to complete strangers. To anyone who’s read any history, a society in this state can be lead to perpetrate the worst imaginable crimes against humanity.

Tying mask wearing to vaccine status is incredibly dangerous because it creates a visible marker of an out group. What’s more, the members of this out group will have been demonized as bad people, and will be dehumanized, and deindividuated as a result of their faces being covered. At the very least, this will create a strong division in our society, in which one group, having been vaccinated, is allowed the privilege of being part of society; and the other group, by virtue of their own personal medical history is excluded from even showing their face in public. At it’s worst, these policies will inch our society towards a calamity akin to those seen in the 20th century. Since vaccines, and masks have been so politicized, it is also likely that the out group marked by mask wearing will actually be a proxy for a political group, which having been located, will be ripe for persecution.

A free, liberal, and just society does not have second class citizens. We rightly do not bifurcate our society by race, class, gender, country of origin, religion, or any of the other limitless and trivial human characteristics. We can not do so on the basis of personal medical history, or personal medical history as a proxy for political affiliation. This is the line in the sand that we as a society must draw, and we must draw it before it’s too late.