WE HAD our booster shots last week. Everything went well. Those administering the process were friendly and professional.
The future is somewhat unclear, however. Originally, we were told that the booster shot should be implemented six months after the second jab. We had this jab last October so that we are on schedule.
Now some medical experts are recommending that we should have an expiration date on our vaccination cards. This implies that further booster shots may be deemed necessary. This is due to waning immunity and the threat of new COVID-19 variants. Time will tell.
What we need is a cohesive dialogue between doctors and relevant government officials. In the Philippines, we have been fortunate that the scientists and politicians have been ‘on the same page’. Long may this continue.
On balance, I am glad that government policy is to strongly encourage vaccinations, but not to make them compulsory. We do not agree with Health Secretary Francisco Duque III who is reportedly hoping that Congress can find the political will to pass legislation that will make vaccination mandatory.
In our fragile democracy we should avoid the specter of the unelected telling the elected what they should do. Senators needed the votes of at least 14 million in order to obtain a Senate seat. This is likely to rise to around 15 million at the next election on May 9. Nobody voted for Duque and, without being too unkind, we consider his chances of electoral success in any future election to be minimal.
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Controversy about the efficacy and safety of vaccination has been around from the very beginning. The discoverer of vaccination, Edward Jenner, an English physician, had a hard time in persuading others to support the procedure.
In 1775, he began to examine the truth of the traditions respecting cowpox, and became convinced that it was efficacious as protection against smallpox.
His crowning experiment was made in 1796 when he vaccinated an eight-year-old boy. A year later, over seventy principal physicians signed a declaration of their confidence in the procedure. This ensured implementation in England but it was not until 1979 that smallpox was considered to be eradicated worldwide./PN
