If a recent survey commissioned by Nine newspapers is correct, Australia is unlikely to achieve herd immunity in the foreseeable future. It found 14 per cent of people were “not at all likely” and 15 per cent “not very likely” to be vaccinated in the months ahead.
Commentator and retired University of Sydney academic Simon Chapman AO thinks he has the answer. “Why not get national momentum up on wearing a pin, badge or special ribbon that says simply ‘I’ve been vaccinated for Covid-19’?” the emeritus professor of public health wrote on his blog last week.
Much like the little stickers they give after you donate blood, you would imagine. Well, not quite. The reasoning in this case is more about exposing the dissenters. “Those without them would (and should!) feel conspicuous by not wearing one,” says Chapman. “Many of those who are quietly refusing to get vaccinated or freeriding on those of us who have got it done would probably also feel the heat.”
This is a fantastic idea, and we should congratulate Chapman for it. A pandemic requires urgent measures. We can still respect the notion of bodily autonomy while belittling, harassing, and ostracising those we suspect of not being vaccinated. All it takes for you to avoid being bailed up by these commissars-for-inoculation is to opt for the jab and display your pin prominently. Surely that is not too much to ask?
Admittedly, this is a slight incursion on civil liberties. But as Chapman declares: “Making vaccine uptake something to be proud of, and refusal something that has consequences is unavoidable.” Because nothing makes one prouder than standing over, for example, an elderly person at a bus stop because she is sans pin. The selfish woman needs to recognise her refusal has consequences.
Why stop at vaccines?
There is however a minor problem with Chapman’s grand plan. Due to medical reasons, some people cannot receive the vaccination, and unfortunately these blameless souls will be unfairly berated. But their number is minuscule, and this mass castigation is for the greater good and based on logic. As the University of Sydney notes on its website: “At the heart of all Simon’s work, scholarly or otherwise, is an inherent premise of intelligent social activism”.
Who knows, perhaps we can expand this program to other facets in the name of the public good. The government could issue pins to show one is employed or otherwise not receiving unemployment benefits. It could do the same for families that pay net tax. The list is endless. Let’s make sure all the freeloaders, to use Chapman’s words, “feel the heat”.
ABC presenter Jonathan Green tweeted this week that vaccination should be “mandatory”. At first I thought this notion ridiculous, believing it would be unsafe and not a good look to drag people kicking and screaming into clinics to be forcibly injected. But then I remembered the aftermath of the Russian ‘Kursk’ submarine disaster in 2000 when an agitated and distraught mother of a lost sailor, having loudly demanded answers of then Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov, collapsed in the arms of officials. Footage showed she had been forcibly sedated from behind with a needle. You see? It can be done efficiently and quickly.
Chapman’s idea has the support of the very influential and notable Peter FitzSimons, author and Sydney Morning Herald columnist. Lest you be in any doubt as to how high he sits in the hierarchy of importance, he made it known on Sunday that he, along with other distinguished guests including former French ambassadors, attended an “intimate dinner” last week at the home of none other than Anne Boillon, Consul General of France.
Simplistic and divisive
“While no one should be forced to be vaccinated against their will,” wrote FitzSimons in that same piece, “the areas in which those who refuse the jab are allowed to go must be limited on the grounds of protecting public health – thus protecting the anti-jabbers from each other, which is who they are a principal danger to.”
He demanded the federal government, once the vaccination has been offered to all, prohibit this group from travelling on bus and plane.
To refer to the one-third surveyed who are hesitant about receiving the vaccine as “anti-jabbers” is simplistic and divisive. As the survey FitzSimons referred to clearly shows, only four per cent of respondents are opposed to all vaccinations. Label the reluctant group refuseniks and every other pejorative if you will, but half of them are concerned about side effects, while 38 per cent say they do not know enough about the vaccines.
A vaccine for the pompous
Many are in the late middle age category and older. Not surprisingly, they tend to be cautious. Harangue them your hardest, sneer at them – even threaten to curtail their rights – but you will achieve nothing, other than exacerbate the problem. A proper information campaign addressing their concerns is the answer, together with appropriate incentives.
As for the latter, I suggest a discount or even a waiver for passport applications and renewals, which in turn would bolster the crippled airline industry. Incidentally, once we have Covid under control, can scientists please develop a vaccine to rid the world of pompous, tin-pot commentators and their obsessions with imposing punitive restrictions. Whoever does so has my vote for the Nobel prize.
Dr Swan and the cult of personality
Last weekend, ABC medical journalist Dr Norman Swan gave a salutary warning about the cult of personality. “The idea of a journalist being a celebrity is anathema, and very dangerous,” he told the Sydney Morning Herald.
This is true. It runs the risk – for example in the case of a medical journalist – of becoming self-enthralled and believing his job is to second-guess government medical experts. This could mean making wild and unfounded extrapolations about Covid case numbers. Or telling Q + A viewers in March last year hospitals in NSW and Victoria would run out of ICU beds by April 10 and that physicians “would be faced with some very difficult decisions”.
That is what can happen if one does not observe Pope’s adage of a little learning being a dangerous thing. It could also mean making laughable predictions during Sydney’s Northern Beaches Covid outbreak in December that the state’s contact tracing system would soon be “overwhelmed” and telling ABC viewers the only solution was to shut down Greater Sydney for two weeks.
This interview with the Sydney Morning Herald was one of those rare moments since the outbreak of the pandemic that Swan – our “national treasure” in the words of ABC chair Ita Buttrose – agreed to talk about himself, albeit reluctantly. As he told this newspaper last month, the boost in his profile was “never what I intended,” lamenting he could no longer go to the supermarket without being recognised.
He can take solace in knowing that sacrificing his anonymity was for the benefit of the nation. As Swan told the Sydney Morning Herald in March last year, he had filled a “vacuum” resulting from the government’s “poor” communication about Covid. “I know how to communicate,” he said.
Aside from that, Swan has strictly observed the golden rule of journalism being about the story, never about the journalist. Apart from the half-hour interview he gave about himself for ABC’s One Plus One in May last year, that is. Did you know that as a young man Swan wanted to go to drama school?
There was also the interview Swan gave to Buzzfeed News in March last year in which he talked of his skyrocketing numbers of Twitter followers. “It’s going up at the same rate as the epidemic, I suspect,” he said modestly. And then there was Swan’s interview with the Today Show in January to promote his book.
But except for that, Swan never talks about himself. That said, there was that time he told Sydney Morning Herald last July that he was 18 when he had his first sexual experience. To reiterate, he believes being a celebrity is anathema to journalism. That is the principle that defines him. No other Scotsman can roll the ‘r’ in reticence quite like Norman.
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