Letter to the Editor: Compulsory vaccination goes against human rights

I fear for children’s safety when I hear that Health Minister Simon Harris continues to push for mandated vaccines ‘Harris targets online lies over vaccines’ (Irish Examiner, August 28). Harris talks about scaremongering as the cause of some parents not choosing vaccination for their children, yet the real scaremongering emanates from government and media campaigns. Quotes of a 200% measles increase are totally misleading when Irish cases are only in double figures and are not out of sync with historical fluctuations in recent decades.

Exposing the ‘herd immunity’ myth, measles cannot be eradicated by vaccination anyway. Vaccines are not effective for everyone and lose effectiveness over time (three years for measles element of MMR), therefore adults are becoming prone to what were once childhood diseases. So adults can spread the disease. I wonder if those advocating compulsory vaccines for children would be happy if vaccines were mandated for adults too? Furthermore, a 2018 journal report quotes official figures that 31% of measles cases were in the already vaccinated, so even a 100% vaccination uptake would not stop measles.