Letter to the Editor: If you have chosen not to be vaccinated, reconsider

Help me to understand why otherwise intelligent people are choosing not to be vaccinated. I am so looking forward to the time when we can return to a semblance of normal life, and know that will happen sooner if everyone who is able, gets vaccinated. If your reason is religious, I don’t understand that. Who do you think created the doctors and scientists who are recommending immunization. If it is because you think it is an infringement upon your “rights”, I am sorry, but just like every other “right” we demand to have, it unwittingly, or deliberately, tramps upon others “rights”, i.e. my right to feel safer. If it is a belief that it doesn’t work, all I can say is whether it works or not, why not just get vaccinated to be kind to your neighbour who does believe it works. If you just think it is unnecessary then ask your parents, grandparents or great grandparents what they remember about life before immunization. What about the children who died or were permanently crippled from Polio, or died from TB or Diphtheria, or were permanently scarred or died from Small Pox. We take for granted, our safety from those diseases because they have been mostly eradicated in Canada, but only because every child in this country was immunized against them when immunization became possible. Read your history!

If it is because you think there is a risk to your health, show me the medical and scientific proof; and may I ask if you take the risk of going somewhere in a motor vehicle? There is a significant risk to life and limb, and not yours alone, in doing that. If you don’t believe me, do the research.

Please, if you have chosen not to be vaccinated, reconsider. Help the rest of us, your friends, neighbours, family, feel safe again.

Donna Holtby
Gull Lake, SK