Resolved: public health concerns justify compulsory vaccinations

My value is autonomy, which is self-directing freedom and self-governance. In society there are certain limits to this but there is a point to which it becomes morally wrong to violate a person's rights. One of those points is the right a person has over their own body. Two major ethicists for bio medics, Beauchamp and Childress clearly state respect for autonomy must be followed in the medical field. When you violate that right it opens the door for many immoral things to happen. My criterion is through Kant's categorical imperative. Kant's second formulation says to never treat a moral agent as a means-to-an-end but always as ends-in-themselves. When we require immunizations it violates a member of societies' right to govern their own body. It is simply using them as a means-to-an-end, violating the categorical imperative and is thus immoral. Contention 1) When members of society are not immunized it can only affect others who are not immunized. According to the Center for Disease Control vaccinations have a very high rate of immunity. For mumps it is 99.57% and for measles it is 99.95%. So when someone in society does not get immunized it will not affect those who are immunized. It only has the chance to affect those who do not get immunized. Therefore, this also makes it moral to refuse immunizations through John Mill's harm principle. Through John Mill's harm principle he makes the exception for children and for consenting adults. So even if those who do not get immunizations harm each other, because they have chosen to not get the immunization, it is moral. Contention 2) Immunizations cause many harmful effects. "They [vaccinations] caused more suffering and more deaths than has any other human activity in the entire history of medical intervention." That is a quote from Dr. Viera Schneiber, with a PhD. Another quote from the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons says, "Measles, mumps, rubella, hepatitis B, and the whole panoply of childhood diseases are a far less serious threat than having a large fraction (say 10%) of a generation afflicted with learning disability and/or uncontrollable aggressive behavior because of an impassioned crusade for universal vaccination." Both of these quotes are saying that vaccinations have negative impacts on those who receive them. They can cause learning disabilities, mental disease and many other problems. Immunizations are a relatively new invention and while they cure disease they also cause a lot of harm. Because of all the harms immunizations cause it is immoral to mandate that a member of society put it in their body. Refutations I agree with all of my opponents definitions except justify. Justify is defined in Random House Unabridged Dictionary as "to show (an act, claim, statement, etc.) to be just or right." Because my Pro offered no source for her definition we must look to mine. My opponent values protection of life. It is the government's duty to protect its citizens from an outside harm. However, when a member of society chooses to not get an immunization that only affects others who choose not to get immunized. Basically you can apply my first contention here. But the point here is that while protecting life is good it is not the governments duty to protect its citizens from themselves. Pros criterion is social contract. Social contract says we must give up some rights for the governments protection. As my opponent states in her intro the way we must determine what rights can justifiably taken away is through John Mill's harm principle. Which essentially says the only rights that can be taken away are rights that would cause harm to others. However, John Mill makes exceptions to this and one of those is consenting adults. For example when two boxers go into a ring they cause harm to each other but this is okay because they have agreed to this. It is the same with immunizations. Immunizations has been defined as to "produce immunity" so by getting an immunization one becomes immune. Therefore when a member of society chooses not to get immunized they have consented to accepting the risk of getting a disease. My opponents observation is clearly abusive. The resolution in no way states that the affirmative only has to give one given case where compulsory immunizations are justifiable. It simply says "public health concerns justify compulsory immunizations." Contention 1) My opponent says here that the social contract justifies compulsory immunizations. As I already stated when refuting the criterion of social contract the only rights that can be taken away are rights that cause harm to others. For example I do not have the right to shoot someone when I get angry. But, once again, John Mill makes the exception for consenting adults. So because a member of society chooses to take the risk of catching a disease by not being immunized it is moral to do so. Contention 2) Sub A: "These vaccinations are more effective at saving lives." Pro says here that smallpox was eradicated with compulsory immunizations but I would like to point out that polio was also eradicated without compulsory immunizations. The people themselves decided to go get immunized which eradicated the disease without the government violating any rights. She also says that those who didn't get immunized were much more likely to get smallpox. Once again it is their choice not to get immunized though so they accept the risk and the government does not have the right to violate their personal liberty to basically protect people from themselves. Sub B: "Vaccinations are cost-effective". Essentially Pro is saying here that vaccinations save money. But no amount of money justifies a government violating a citizens rights. The definition of justify is to do what is right or just and it is not right to violate every member of societies rights for money. Sub C: Here Pro says that more people get immunized when the laws require immunizations. But I think this is obvious, when something is mandatory of course more people will get it. She then states that on the Pro you can give exemptions to anyone who does not want to be immunized when she says "exemptions for medical and religious restrictions can still be justifiably exempted. This clearly is not compulsory immunizations because anyone can just say their religion does not allow for them to get immunized and they don't have to. As my opponent defined compulsory it is "mandatory under current law" so allowing for all of these exemptions means the immunizations are clearly not mandatory. Contention 3) Again going back to my opponents intro where she talks about the harm principle the only rights that can be taken away are those that harm others. (Please simply apply the same analysis as I've already stated in my refuations and my first contention on the exception because I am running out of room.) So yes government is supposed to protect its citizens, as John Locke says, government must protect its citizens' individual rights these are clearly not protected and are completely trampled on by compulsory immunizations. Pro also says that the U.S. supreme court upheld compulsory immunizations however this is irrelelvant becuase the resolution is not U.S. specific and this is just one court at one point in time. In any other society the ruling could have been the exact opposite. Finally Pro says that there are other compulsory laws making this one ok and sites an example where an exception was made where an immunizations would cause harm. Just because compulsory laws exist doesn't make them just and most of those laws are to prevent unwilling harm. In reference to the court case of course if the immunizations causes harm then it should not be force upon someone. But an immunizations is not compulsory if religous exceptions are allowed because it is no longer mandatory and anyone can get out of it.