Political matter: What is the extent to which we want to allow people to make their own decisions when these decisions have an impact on the well-being of others?
Whatever your answer to the second question is (an exercise which I leave to the reader) is going to have an impact on the degree of inclusion and on the degree of accommodation that should be extended to people who choose not to vaccinate. Respect and love is possible and encouraged in all cases.
As a bonus, for further consideration...
Ethical matter: What is the moral value of an ill-informed decision, and is the moral value of an ill-informed decision sufficient to support the principle of individual autonomy?
Nearly every decision one makes has an impact on the well-being of others. On the one end, you can't shoot someone just because you feel like it. On the other end, a teenage boy asks a girl out, the girl Decides to reject him, and he is so devastated he commits suicide. Somewhere in the middle, I decide to drive to work today, my wheel goes flying off, I careen into oncoming traffic killing myself and another; if only I had Decided to take the bus today.
Obviously we, as a society, draw a line somewhere. I don't know if where we draw that line today is actually the correct place, or if there even is a "correct" place to draw it.
My opinion on vaccine mandates, right now, is: They're probably bad. Not because of personal liberty, though that may be a valid argument; I'm just not sure (I'm not sure I'll ever be sure; I'm willing to admit that decision is above my pay grade). But because the vaccines we have right now are actually not great at stopping the spread of the virus. They do save lives and keep people out of the hospital, but that's separate from the argument that they keep your coworkers safe. We're definitely sacrificing personal liberty, which may be bad, for tenuous benefit.
There's another similar argument: Keeping preventable cases out of the Hospital is a public good, because medical care is a limited resource that is VERY stressed right now. This, actually, resonates more with me. I think this is a stronger argument for vaccine mandates. Your personal liberties may have to end when you call 911 and expect someone else to answer and save your life, and I think demanding wide vaccination is morally superior to refusing care to a dying man because he chose not to get vaccinated.
But the bigger issue with this argument is determining why the medical system is so close to the brink of collapse; I suspect it has less to do with COVID, and more to do with doctors and nurses being treated like shit, which significantly pre-dates COVID, leading to burnout and people leaving the industry. I have a vivid memory from 20 years ago, being 10 or something, sitting in the car with my mom after her nurse shift, she's near tears and asks me if I think its fair that Brittany Spears can make millions but nurses make almost nothing. I still feel guilt today, making so much money in tech, while our nurses (and teachers, and many other insanely important industries) make so little; it isn't right. If we, as a society, were significantly better at supporting our healthcare providers, its possible we could support personal liberty and manage the consequences of that liberty, at least in this domain. (and, to be clear, that support isn't just paying more; its also mental health, and time off, and streamlining management, and training more people to join the industry. its a big problem)
There's also one argument against mandates which resonates very well with me: That the systems we have in place to validate vaccinations rarely take into account natural immunity. If this were intentional, e.g. natural immunity sucks so we need you to get a vaccine, then that's one thing. But it seems like this is a discussion we simply haven't had, in the US. Natural immunity seems to be a thing, so we should be inclusive and give people that path. But we aren't; we demand the Record Card. This seems to be a net bad; either policymakers need to say "natural immunity isn't effective at stopping infection" or mandates need to allow for a positive test result, at any point in the past (e.g.) year, to be sufficient as a replacement for a vaccine.
One local company has taken on the policy "vaccination or get tested twice a week". This is utter insanity, and its a big reason why so much of America, on both sides of the political spectrum but especially the right, has lost faith in the system. These policies essentially, to many people, say "sacrifice your personal liberty, or significantly inconvenience both you and our health care system by getting tested a ton." Private companies should not have the ability to put that kind of stress on our already stressed health care system in the dumb pursuit of utilizing their expensive office real estate. At the very least, the government needs to step in and say that companies cannot demand ongoing testing; that I 100% support. If a company decides to mandate only vaccination after that, I think that's far more gray, and while I am fully vaccinated, it still doesn't sit right with me. But, maybe its the right decision for them and their workers.
The naturally immunity thing is fraught. Accepting for argument that naturally immunity is exactly as good as the best vaccine, it's reasonable to equate vaccinated and recovered at a point in time. Covid has done all the damage it's going to do to the recovered group, and both are as protected as the other going forward (per assumption).
However, offering 'vaccine or recovery' as an option going forward is more harmful if there are any remaining unvaccinated/uninfected people. Some _will_ choose the 'recovery' option, at immense personal (illness, possible long-term damage, possible death) and societal (health-care over-burden, transmission effects, etc.) expense. Splitting the currently-recovered from uninfected/unvaccinated for policy-making purposes would require either faith in self-reporting or significant invasion into health records. Neither seem tenable in the US, for obvious reasons of culture and law. IIRC other countries are taking that route.
Which leaves you, I think, where your comment started. Are the external costs of assuming the risk large enough that policy should proscribe that option and mandate vaccines?
