Written by: Andrew Morris
Upon the recent developments in the Delta variant of the Covid-19 virus, Los Angeles Unified School District has mandated vaccines for all students and faculty.
Though many health officials push for all student vaccines to be distributed, many courageously refuse. Currently, the FDA has approved all vaccines for anyone 16 and older. However, they have yet to approve vaccines for kids 15 and younger.
Despite it not being federally approved, the LAUSD has taken it upon themselves to set a Nov. 3 deadline for students 12 and older to get their first dose, as well as a Dec. 19 deadline for the second dose.
Though most other school districts have taken little to no action to mimic this system, health officials like Monica Gandhi from UC San Francisco and Andy Noymer from UC Irvine are pushing for vaccines across the board.
“We already ask children to get vaccinated for preventable illnesses like measles, mumps, and rubella,” Gandhi states. “These kinds of mandates that keep society immune have been around a long time.”
Noymer contends that the vaccine was prioritized in adults by the FDA because they are more at risk from the virus than safety concerns for the kids. “The idea was never that we need to protect these children from vaccines because vaccines are experimental and dangerous, we vaccinate kids all the time.”
The problem with this reasoning is regardless of the safety of the virus; it should be one’s individual right to choose whether they want to get vaccinated. It should be up to every father, mother, and child if they wish to take it or not.
Yet government agencies like LAUSD and many others are mandating these infringements for everyone, even for people barely old enough to formulate their own thoughts and opinions. LAUSD has taken it upon themselves to make these critical parental decisions, their own decisions.
Photo from: AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes
