Mask and Vaccine Mandates: The Need for Discernment

Why I am opposed to Covid-19 vaccine and mask mandates for different reasons, and why this matters

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The debate surrounding Covid-19 mask and vaccine mandates has been more politicized in the United States than in any other country in the world. The battle lines are drawn clearly: on one side, liberals urge everyone to “believe in the science” and put social welfare over individual choice during a pandemic; on the other side, conservatives propound a “don’t tread on me” politics that views the individual right to refuse masking or vaccination alongside freedom of speech as a core American value.

There are certainly positions betwixt and between these two camps, but anyone living in America can place most of their friends and acquaintances in one of the two sides of this proverbial culture war. While I am sympathetic to many of the arguments that underlie the mainstream anti-mandate position, such as the protection of bodily autonomy and a principled defense of individual liberties, I do not think it is wise to apply the same logic indiscriminately to all Covid-19 mandates and restrictions.

The conflation of mask and vaccine mandates in mainstream anti-mandate discourse illustrates the pitfalls of a one size fits all approach to anti-mandate politics. I am strongly opposed to both mask and Covid-19 vaccine mandates, but for different reasons. At this juncture of the anti-mandate struggle, I believe that it is just as important to know why we are opposed to these mandates as it is that we voice our opposition.

Let us be clear about the distinction: A mask is a mechanical intervention ostensibly deployed to slow the community spread of respiratory viruses such as Covid-19. A vaccine is an irreversible biomedical intervention aimed at protecting the vaccinated individual from infection or severe illness and death. Even though the people who support mask and vaccine mandates may be the same, these are logically and ethically two different kinds of mandates. To argue against both in the name of a facile conception of individual "freedom” or “liberty” is logically akin to liberals who attempt to justify coercive vaccine mandates by analogy with seat belt laws.

Seat belts are, like masks, a mechanical intervention, whereas vaccines are in a different category altogether on account of their irreversible, biological character. Vaccines are quite literally a physical penetration of the recipient’s body. Does this difference mean that we should support mask mandates? No. Cloth and surgical masks are ineffective at preventing the spread of respiratory viruses, and N95s are unlikely to prevent viral transmission outside of tightly controlled clinical environments. Hence, the best argument against mask mandates is fundamentally an empirical, consequentialist one: masks do not stop the spread of Covid-19; therefore, masks should not be mandated. Covid-19 vaccine mandates, while also fiercely debated within the consequentialist framework of efficacy, are most importantly a matter of ethical principle. These vaccine mandates pose the question: does the state or an employer have the moral right to mandate a novel injection in the name of the broader “social good”?

Even if the Covid-19 vaccines were 100% effective at stopping infection and transmission, I do not believe a mandate would be justified. Why? For starters, despite evidence of serious risks which took months to identify, neither the CDC nor the pharmaceutical industry has demonstrated that these vaccines are safe for everyone subjected to mandates. The burden of proof is on them to show through long-term randomized control trials that these vaccines are safe.

Let us not forget that Pfizer paid the largest criminal fine in US history for drug misbranding and that Johnson & Johnson intentionally downplayed the risks and exaggerated the benefits of opioids, thereby fueling the opioid epidemic, which is now the leading cause of death for Americans aged 18-45. Despite the abysmal track record of these companies on drug safety, there is still an utter lack of transparency surrounding the Covid-19 vaccines after over a year of rollout. Even when information is brought to the public by hard-won court orders, essential data is redacted. The result is a rational distrust of the science and public health establishment that will last for years to come.  

Why does all of this matter? The ruling class, with the support of a bankrupt public health bureaucracy, has maintained internally contradictory policies throughout the pandemic. One recent and exceedingly absurd example is New York City’s Covid-19 policy, which bans unvaccinated basketball star Kyrie Irving from playing for the Brooklyn Nets in the city, but allows him to attend home games unmasked at the Barclays Center. Anti-mandate advocates should take care not to make similar logical missteps in our resistance to mask and vaccine mandates. People are hungry for the consistency and integrity that public health bureaucrats and politicians have failed to provide, and it is up to us to be accountable.

The best and, in my view, most logically defensible argument against mask mandates is a consequentialist one that rests on efficacy data. While certain adverse effects of masking could open the door to a principled ethical appeal against mask mandates, such an appeal must be careful not to paper over the very real differences between mask and vaccine mandates. To conflate the two mandates hurts the case against both.

Short of N95s in highly controlled clinical environments, there is no evidence to suggest that masks make a significant dent in the transmission of respiratory viruses like Covid-19. The social costs of masking, especially for children, while not in the same ethical category as vaccine mandates, are immense. In the future, policymakers should set an extremely high bar for mask mandates supported by real evidence that the benefits of this non-pharmacological intervention will, in select scenarios, outweigh the extensive and now well-documented costs. If, as I suspect, this evidence cannot be mustered, mask mandates should forever be put to an end.

The ethics of vaccine mandates—especially in the case of the novel Covid-19 vaccines—demand a form of moral reasoning beyond mere cost-benefit analysis. The kind of deontological thinking required would recognize that an irreversible biomedical intervention like coerced injection belongs in a different, more weighty, ethical category than mechanical interventions like masks and seat belts. Covid-19 vaccine mandates are unethical for reasons entirely independent from problems of vaccine efficacy. This principled moral objection to the Covid-19 vaccine mandates, as opposed to the never-ending debates about ever-changing efficacy data, should be the foundation of the movement against Covid-19 vaccine mandates.