As grossly unconstitutional vaccine mandates continue to sweep the nation, one jurisdiction has taken the absurdity a step further. The city of San Francisco will soon begin requiring young children to be vaccinated in order to enter public places. During a Zoom meeting last week, the San Francisco Department of Health announced that children aged five and older will be required to present proof of vaccination upon entering places where adults are currently required to show proof. San Francisco Health Officer Dr. Susan Phillip announced during a virtual town hall that the mandate will take effect about eight weeks after the vaccine becomes available to children. The state of California already requires students to be vaccinated in order to attend school. Now, San Francisco children will need to carry a vaccine card in order to enter restaurants, enjoy indoor events, take swimming lessons, and more, posing an intolerable threat to parental rights.
San Francisco is the first city to implement a vaccine mandate for children, but it will likely not be the last. This is a grave infringement upon parental rights and religious freedom that paves the way for other jurisdictions to do the same.
Parents have a variety of reasons for not wanting to vaccinate their children. Some cite religious objections, health reasons, distrust of the government, vaccine side effects, and others. Regardless of their reasoning, it is the right of every parent, as protected by the Constitution, to make the personal decision to have his or her child injected with a foreign substance. It is also the right of every person to refuse anything that contradicts his or her religious beliefs.
Not only is San Francisco’s new mandate unconstitutional, it’s illogical. Children are very unlikely to suffer from a severe case of the disease. Most children have mild symptoms or are asymptomatic when they contract it. Young children have accounted for 0.1 percent of COVID deaths in America and no one under the age of 20 has reportedly died from the virus in the city. Nonetheless, children aged five and older will be required to wear masks in public places even after they are vaccinated. Not even a negative COVID-19 test will suffice, despite the fact that a vaccinated person could still spread the disease, meaning negative tests would be more effective in preventing the spread. In addition, the city will not take natural immunity into account for children who have already had the virus. The lack of scientific support for the mandate suggests that it is not in the name of public safety, but control.
Fortunately, many Americans are not willing to give up their rights so easily. The Alliance Defending Freedom recently filed several lawsuits against the Biden Administration over the president’s national vaccine mandate, and several other institutions have followed suit. This is the kind of bold action that the U.S. desperately needs more of in order to reestablish boundaries for our representatives. Government overreach of any kind sets a dangerous precedent, and San Francisco’s latest violation should wake the masses, as public officials seek to make health decisions for young children. For the sake of parental rights and religious freedom, vaccine mandates cannot be tolerated.
