Public health concerns justify compulsory immunization

In a 1974 a report ascribing 36 reactions to whooping cough (pertussis) vaccine, a prominent public-health academic claimed that the vaccine was only marginally effective and questioned whether its benefits outweigh its risks, and extended television and press coverage caused a scare. Vaccine uptake in the UK decreased from 81% to 31% and whooping cough epidemics followed, leading to deaths of some children. Mainstream medical opinion continued to support the effectiveness and safety of the vaccine; public confidence was restored after the publication of a national reassessment of vaccine efficacy. Vaccine uptake then increased to levels above 90% and disease incidence declined dramatically. The reason I supply this evidence is to prove that immunizations do not need to be compulsory to have affective widespread result of getting vaccinated. Public health concerns justify compulsory immunization. I negate. Definitions and observations: Public health: The approach to medicine that is concerned with the health of the community as a whole. Public health is community health. (MedTerms Dictionary.com) Concerns: Matters that engage attention, interest, and care (Random House Dictionary, 2009) Justify: To prove to be just or right. (Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law, 1996) Compulsory: Required and mandated by law. Obligatory (Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law, 1996) Immunization: Treatment of an organism for the purpose of making it immune to subsequent attack by a particular pathogen, typically achieved by introducing the organism to the living or dead pathogen. OBSEVATION 1: For the context of this debate, the Neg does not have to prove that all immunizations are bad, and that immunizations are not affective, just that immunization should never be made compulsory. My core value is Justice. Justice, according to the Thomas Aquinas is defined as giving each their due. My criterion is Governmental Legitimacy through preserving Natural Rights. Governmental legitimacy is the preferred criterion in the round for three reasons. First, government is the only entity with the right to compel individuals to behave in specific ways--in this case, to be immunized. Giving this power to any other entity justifies community witch hunts, lynch mobs, and vigilante justice. Second, public health is within the government's purview because all questions of overall community welfare must be addressed by the government. This idea stems from social contract theory. Third, granting any other entity the right to compel individuals to get immunized would erode governmental authority and encourage anarchy. CONTENTION 1: A LEGITIMATE GOVERNMENT HAS AN OBLIGATION TO PRESERVE NATURAL RIGHTS. Channing explains, (The Collected Works of William Channing, as quoted in Reflections in American Political Thought, 1973, p. 92), "Human rights, however, are not to be so reasoned away. They belong ... to man as a moral being, and nothing can divest him of them but the destruction of his nature. They are not to be given up to society as a prey. On the contrary, the great end of civil society is to secure them. The great end of government is to repress all wrong. Its highest function is to protect the weak against the powerful, so that the most obscure human being may enjoy his rights in peace." CONTENTION 2: NATURAL RIGHTS CANNOT BE SACRIFICED FOR THE 'GREATER GOOD.' Rawls explains in A Theory of Justice, "Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this reason justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right by a greater good enjoyed by others. It does not allow that the sacrifices imposed on a few are outweighed by the larger sum of advantages enjoyed by many. Therefore in a just society the liberties of equal liberty are taken as settled; the rights secured by justice are not subject to political bargaining or to the calculus of social interests." CONTENTION 3: COMPULSORY VACCINATION VIOLATES INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS. Calandrillo explains in the University of Michigan Journal of Legal Reform, "In addition to the potential safety risks associated with immunizations, anti-vaccinationists raise the classic American values of freedom and individualism as grounds for their objections to compulsory vaccination laws. Groups opposed to government interference in personal lives vociferously argue that no one, especially not the state, can dictate what they can do with their body (or their child's body for that matter). Mandatory vaccination is therefore an unwarranted interference with basic human autonomy and liberty. In fact, nearly 4 out of 5 websites opposing vaccination argue that current U.S. immunization laws are a violation of civil liberties. In particular, many cite newly created electronic vaccine registries as an example of "Big Brother" intruding into private lives. Antivaccinationists further characterize public health authorities as abusive, untrustworthy and paternalistic. Resisting forced immunization, on the other hand, is equated with the noble fight against government oppression. CONTENTION 4: COMPELLING INDIVIDUALS TO GET VACCINATED VIOLATES A GOVERNMENTS LEGITIMACY. Dr. Edward Younkins of Wheeling Jesuit University explains, "New conceptions of sovereignty and politics have recently become popular with the result that people have increasingly come to regard the government as a source of rights rather than as a defender of pre-existing individual rights. The assumption of this new view is that a right is not simply a freedom to do a certain thing, but is the privilege of forcing others to take positive actions to provide some perceived entitlement. If this were true, a right would not be seen as a freedom but rather as a power. To the founders, a right was a moral principle or imperative defining and sanctioning a man's freedom of action in a social context. Such a right represents a man's absolute power to seek an end. Under this process view of rights, the only duty imposed on others by such rights is the negative duty of forbearance – of not interfering with that to which a person has a right. If a person has a right to perform a certain activity, then others have the obligation not to interfere with that activity. It follows that there are no group rights – only individual rights. Group rights are arbitrary and imply special interests. The state is not involved in the creation of rights – it mainly exists to protect an individual's natural rights. Concerned with protecting the self-directedness of individuals, rights are a metanormative concept that provides law with a moral underpinning. Natural rights impose a negative obligation – the obligation not to interfere with one's liberty. Being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another with respect to his life, liberty, or possessions. It is illegitimate to use coercion against a man who does not first undertake the use of force. The role of government is to protect man's natural rights through the use of force, but only in retaliation, and only against those who initiate its use.