Our knack of reckoning risk needs an urgent booster

That people need the urging of the nation’s leading medical professionals to get vaccinated with AstraZeneca (“Don’t wait for Pfizer, get AZ now”, 5/8) is deplorable and a bad reflection on the alarmism and scaremongering being practised, including by those who should know better.

That alarmism is based on the (remote) possibility of dying from an AstraZeneca jab; a risk so remote that we are thousands of times more likely to die in a car accident. Yet it is a safe bet all of these alarmists still drive.

I accept ordinary people are prone to alarmism, but not that responsible public officials and politicians escape being held accountable for promoting it.

Andrew Lake, Edwardstown, SA

Am I the only one who finds Anthony Albanese’s call to make a $300 incentive payment to Australians to get vaccinated offensive? What have we become as a society when one of our leading politicians believes we have to be bribed to take a relatively simple action to save lives and livelihoods? My dad – who put up his age by two years to enlist – along with all our brave Diggers who volunteered and fought for the freedoms we enjoy today must be looking down at us and shaking heads in absolute disgust.

Rod Heffernan, Marcoola, Qld

Ian Parmenter (Last Post, 5/8) is using the wrong measure – the percentage of those vaccinated – to rate Australia’s Covid response. It is the number of people who have died that should be counted.

On this measure, Australia is doing extremely well, with only 927 deaths to date, as opposed to comparable countries, such as Canada with 26,500 deaths.

Derrick Austin, Currumbin Waters, Qld

Scott Morrison needs to pull the trigger and make Covid vaccinations mandatory, no matter who you are or what you believe. We have been told that the only way of dealing with Covid is to get vaccinated. The time has come for the Prime Minister and the parochial premiers to put Australians and their health first.

Last-minute lockdowns must stop. They are killing us, in one way or another. People need to remember that if you do not get vaccinated and you contract the Delta strain, you could die and take your loved ones with you.

Peter Surkitt, Sandringham, Vic

The moment a vaccination goes into the arm of someone who does not desire it is truly the moment this country surrenders personal freedom. This constant refrain to get vaccinated, from politicians and the media, is like an exhortation to the mob. Those who choose to remain unvaccinated already are being denounced as deranged or akin to unclean.

Nothing in that approach contributes to the so-called common good. Personal choice should be paramount.

Scott Cassidy, Safety Beach, Vic

The best vax incentive is Alan Joyce’s idea of a vax travel passport. Who wants to share an enclosed tube with the unvaccinated?

Dr Tim Coyle, Earlville, NSW

“Experts should be on tap but never on top.” Thus did Winston Churchill encapsulate the role of the specialist adviser. It is an adage that, as Greg Sheridan writes, has not always been observed in the Covid-induced saga (“Covid has changed us culturally”, 5/8). Hence advice proffered by ATAGI on the risks to the young from AstraZeneca, coupled with the Queensland chief health officer’s dramatic warning, has tragically slowed response to a vaccine offering hope of resumption of normal life.

Advice and warnings given by appointed background boffins are important, indeed of the essence, to their role. Yet it is the elected politician who must make a considered decision. And that can be done only by taking account of all other relevant advice, risk analysis and the public interest.

John Kidd, Auchenflower, Qld

China will continue to lie about and deny the origins of Covid (“Wuhan games athletes ‘took the virus global’ ”, 5/8). The absence of the rule of law and the failure to develop a system of separation of powers has made lying the only defence for both rulers and ruled to avoid responsibility and draconian punishment.

Leninism brought the practice into the modern age and the Chinese Communist Party and its leaders have perfected the art.

Jim Wilson, Beaumont, SA