Ask Cook County Board of Commissioners to Reverse Vaccine Mandates
January 11, 2022
Universities and Colleges Throughout the United States are Attempting to Coerce Employees and Students
into Getting COVID-19 Vaccines
Students, Parents, and Employees Take Action
Some Higher Education Institutions are Embracing Coercion and Torpedoing
Fundamental Rights to Consent and Bodily Autonomy
Co-Authored by National Health Freedom Action and California Health Coalition Advocacy
Across the country, there are institutions of higher education that are implementing policies for both college students and staff employees requiring COVID-19 vaccination as a condition of education and employment. For those who decline the vaccine or obtain an exemption for medical or religious reasons, they are further asked to comply with a separate set of standards that might include:
- Not being allowed on campus at all
- Exclusion from certain campus events, services or housing
- Required testing and tracking
- Limited or total lack of access to classroom instruction
- Measures that alienate the refusers such as masking and distancing
These additional requirements are coercive tools to get students and employees to agree to vaccinations when they would otherwise choose not to submit to this medical intervention. Shockingly, these colleges are holding students’ educational aspirations hostage in return for participation in an experimental medical intervention.
These Coercive Tactics Have NO Place in a Free Society.
Pressure on campus decisionmakers is coming from many sources. Governors, legislators, unions, public health departments, trustees, and even the President are pressuring colleges to help the nation reach vaccination goals.
Coercion puts students at risk and destroys medical ethics. The vaccine requirements ignore the risk/benefit profile for young people and violate rights of voluntary consent and bodily autonomy before participating in a medical intervention or treatment.
The principle of voluntary consent is recognized internationally. The Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights states “Any preventive, diagnostic and therapeutic medical intervention is only to be carried out with the prior, free and informed consent of the person concerned, based on adequate information.”
Data from the federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System showed 329,021 reports of adverse events following COVID vaccines (which are only authorized for emergency use), including 5,888 deaths and 28,441 serious injuries between Dec. 14, 2020 and June 4, 2021.The CDC’s data show that after the second dose of mRNA vaccines, the risk of myocarditis/pericarditis in people under 25 could be magnitudes above the expected rate for this age group in general. In addition, Children’s Health Defense reported yesterday that:
“Today, the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) said that there is ‘likely’ a link between heart inflammation and Pfizer, Moderna COVID vaccines. During the ACIP meeting, the committee members acknowledged 1,200 cases of heart inflammation in 16- to 24-year-olds, and said mRNA COVID vaccines should carry a warning statement. Overall, the officials emphasized that the benefits of COVID vaccines outweigh the risks. Physicians and other public commenters strongly disagreed accusing the CDC of exaggerating the risk to young people of COVID, and minimizing the risk of the COVID vaccines.”
Yet college and university policymakers are choosing to ignore the high number of reports of serious adverse events by healthy individuals.
Students and Families Can Protect Their Health and Rights
Colleges that are choosing to require the vaccine, are offering “accommodations” or “exemptions” to the COVID-19 vaccination requirement but accommodations are not identical to exemptions. Accommodations are based on federal employment law requiring employers to provide medical or religious accommodations to their employees. Exemptions are often based on state law and public policy.
At a college that is offering accommodations, students who wish to decline the injections due to religious reasons may be asked to participate in the federally-designed employment process of obtaining a “religious accommodation”. It requires both students and employees to formally request an accommodation, then requires them to provide documentation regarding religious beliefs to a college committee for review and assessment. The request may or may not be accepted. If the review is accepted then the institution may further require a student or employee to abide by additional policies for persons choosing not to be vaccinated (such as masking, frequent testing, or off-campus living, etc.). If the request is denied, then the student is forced to violate his/her beliefs or drop out.
At a college that is offering “exemptions”, students who wish to decline the injections might be able to decline in good faith based on state law if available, including based on their sincerely held religious beliefs, or conscientiously held beliefs according to their state laws. However, they also may be required to abide by further vaccine policies.
The People are Mobilizing and Working to Overturn these Draconian Measures
State legislatures and Governors have entered the conversation and have passed laws and governor executive orders, stating that businesses and schools cannot require COVID-19 vaccination. (See Righttorefuse.org to check if your state has passed a law recently). In addition, lawyers are filing individual and class action lawsuits against colleges and their boards of trustees. Groups are forming to rally against requirements or to demand broad exemptions and equal treatment of vaccinated individuals and unvaccinated individuals. Parents are engaging with decision makers at colleges and impacting policies on COVID-19 mitigation measures. And, petitions are starting.
People are rising up because when our most revered institutions use coercion toward their supposedly-esteemed students and employees regarding such an important human right as health freedom, and cast off the most deeply-held American value of personal liberty and autonomy, we are in grave danger of losing America itself.
The Time is NOW to TAKE ACTION to Protect Health Freedom and Civil Liberties.
- Write a letter, or set up a meeting, with decisionmakers at your local schools or institutions of higher education, urging them to abandon any policy that would mandate a COVID-19 vaccine for students and employees. If a COVID-19 vaccine policy is being considered, make sure it includes:
- exemptions for those who object based on medical, religious, or personal reasons;
- exemptions for those who have been exposed to SARS-CoV-2 and have immunity;
- equal access to campus activities regardless of COVID-19 vaccination status and without asymptomatic testing; and
- prohibition of vaccine passports or other vaccine status disclosures which might violate medical privacy and lead to discrimination.
Click Here to see State-by-state look at colleges requiring COVID-19 vaccines.
Click Here to view sample letter to colleges
- Write similar letters to your federal, state, and local elected officials. And take the opportunity to share your feelings on the matter with your local media outlets.
- Sign petitions. Here is an example. Petition: Rights of Employees and Students to Decline COVID-19 Vaccines.
- Support parent/student groups by signing up for newsletters, offering to volunteer time, or providing financial support if you can.
- Lastly, take a public stand with your family and friends, particularly on the primary social media platform you use in your circle. At this stage, there is a LOT of new information coming out on a daily, sometimes hourly, basis. People are starting to awaken to the grave threat to health, and to our civil liberties. The media and government agencies have belittled and shamed those who are COVID-vaccine concerned. By taking a public, reasoned, reasonable and clear stand, you will encourage your friends and family to not be afraid.
MORE ACTION ALERTS
