Individual liberties permeate the news but somehow we forget that the public (often called the herd) has rights too. Let me site a few examples. The US military stands guard to protect not any one person, but all of America (the herd). The Federal Reserve Bank is empowered to protect the entire US economy, (the herd). Protecting the herd minimizes problems and sustains the economy.
On 9/11/2001 the terrorist attack brought the entire US economy to a halt for about one week. In 2008 the financial meltdown brought the US economy almost to a halt, wrung trillions of dollars out of the economy and cost millions of Americans their jobs.
A similar threat arises from parents choosing to not vaccinate their children. Measles are a very nasty disease. It not only weakens the immune system directly, but it wipes out the memory of the immune system. This means that people who are susceptible to diseases they would normally be immune from, if not for having the measles, are at risk of contracting the disease because parents choose to risk the hazards of measles rather than the fear of vaccines. As a result, we risk quarantines and panics such as the Ebola scare that plagued Africa just a few months ago and the economic devastation was huge for those countries.
The US health Department might take a stand for the herd and issue stringent rules concerning vaccines rather than condoning the choice of a few individuals.
Source:
