> Neither of the opinions should ever be codified into law.
There's a really good reason to make vaccines mandatory/heavily incentivized however, which is because you need a certain critical portion of the population to get them before they really are effective at reducing the spread of a particular disease.
If, say, only 10% of the population is vaccinated against polio then there will always be plenty of people around that the disease can spread to. Those 10% won't get polio, but it doesn't really benefit society as a whole. On the other hand, if 95% of people are vaccinated then the disease will have a very hard time spreading and [ideally] can be completely eradicated. Even the un-vaccinated 5% benefit since their chances of exposure are much lower. Assuming you agree that vaccines are harmless (I realize some people don't, nor are they totally without negative side effects), it's in the best interest of society as a whole to vaccinate widely.
There's a really good reason to make vaccines mandatory/heavily incentivized however, which is because you need a certain critical portion of the population to get them before they really are effective at reducing the spread of a particular disease.
If, say, only 10% of the population is vaccinated against polio then there will always be plenty of people around that the disease can spread to. Those 10% won't get polio, but it doesn't really benefit society as a whole. On the other hand, if 95% of people are vaccinated then the disease will have a very hard time spreading and [ideally] can be completely eradicated. Even the un-vaccinated 5% benefit since their chances of exposure are much lower. Assuming you agree that vaccines are harmless (I realize some people don't, nor are they totally without negative side effects), it's in the best interest of society as a whole to vaccinate widely.