[Tmarkwald]

Originally Posted by blueash

Nobody has herd immunity. The only way the herd is immune is when enough people have been immunized or have natural immunity from having been infected. Those are the only two options. As of today no one knows how long the protection from infection or immunization lasts. No one knows how well infection or immunization will protect against the mutations which are continuously emerging. But knowing the patient has been vaccinated is the best indicator we have at this point that the person is not likely to become ill or infectious. So if the public health goal is to minimize further spread of Covid and we are going to place large numbers of people in situations where we know spread is accelerated [ships, airplanes, gyms] then having a way to document who is as safe as possible to in those environments is a good public health measure.

If we had a way to produce a certificate that accurately said "This person is a reliable hand washer and will not likely spread E. coli or Hepatitis A" it would be a reasonable requirement to demand for a restaurant worker. A Covid passport would be a certificate that says "this person is unlikely to spread Covid to others" Public health does trump personal "freedom". This is the 100th anniversary of the case of Mary Mallon losing her freedom for the safety of the public.

And mandatory vaccination have been upheld several times by the Supreme Court in the interest of public safety.