The melodrama surrounding the Covid vaccine that began on Saturday with the arrival of the shots, culminated yesterday with President Nicos Anastasiades getting the jab and breathlessly declaring it ‘the gift of life’.
The welcome arrival of the vaccine has been treated, not so much with a sigh of relief as you would expect, but more like the Second Coming in a manner that borders on religious fervour.
First to receive the vaccine on Sunday during yet another Oscars-style ceremony was an elderly man at a Nicosia care home who categorically stated that “anyone who refuses to be vaccinated, for me, are traitors because they are collaborating with an enemy who is a murderer.”
As dramatic as that sounded, it’s hard to blame him or the other elderly people who fear the coronavirus since they are the people most likely to have the worst of it, but the ministry’s use of the most vulnerable to get its vaccination message out is as cynical as it was when the same tactic was used in other countries.
The UK did not take care of its elderly during the height of the pandemic but paraded 81-year-old William Shakespeare across TV screens as the second person to be vaccinated. His name was probably just coincidental but at the same time, Joe Bloggs might not have garnered as much attention.
Anastasiades also dutifully made his appeal to the vaccine hesitant, saying he acknowledges their free will as he knows state mandated vaccination will not fly.
According to the UN, the right to health contains both freedoms and entitlements. “The freedoms include the right to control one’s health and body… the right to be free from interference, such as… non-consensual medical treatment. Thus, health is not a public good to be pursued independent of the will of each individual but requires respect for the will of the individual person with respect to his or her own well-being.” People may argue this but as it stands, it’s enshrined in human rights law whether anyone likes it or not.
This is why governments have shied away from mandatory vaccination although a number, including Cyprus, threw the idea out there initially, probably to gauge public reaction, which has been negative and probably has less to do with vaccine hesitancy than it does to an allergic reaction to government diktats.
This is why the tactic now is to cajole. Covid, and everything surrounding it, has taken on quasi-religious proportions. It’s being turned into a moral issue to the point where someone who decides against the jab is simply a bad person (a sinner) or a Covid denier or conspiracy theorist (heretic), all irrespective of their reasons.
And, right on cue, once the president said he respected free will, he launched into the moral argument, calling for solidarity. “The vaccine is what will protect us, the vaccine is what will strengthen not just hope, but the right to life,” he declared, sounding more like the Archbishop talking about Holy Communion.
Clearly, the government is desperate for the country to get back on its feet and has started a crusade to convince people to be vaccinated voluntarily so that can happen the soonest. It’s perfectly understandable, but in matters of public health, emotional manipulation should not be the main method of persuasion. There is a word for it when governments do this. It’s called propaganda.
