UIC opposes COVID-19 vaccination drives

A group of anti-vaxxers from the United Independent Congress (UIC), Jamaica’s third registered political party, staged a demonstration in Spanish Town, St Catherine, last Saturday. The group is demanding that the Andrew Holness administration halt the present mass vaccination drives and provide Jamaicans with other options to combat COVID-19.

In an open defiance against what they claimed were a trampling of constitutional rights and freedoms, and harming of the country’s children by forcing them to take the vaccine, the group raised slogans such as “my body, my choice” and “no force, my right”, and paraded with placards as they voiced their concerns. They also accused the Government of governing by trickery.

President of the UIC, Joseph Patterson, who led the protesters, told The Gleaner that their action was geared to defending the rights of all Jamaicans and that Government is trying to use vaccination to divide the masses.

“The Government is adopting policies or rules that pressure people into taking this substance, and we don’t necessarily think it is a vaccine,” Patterson said.

“They are using fearmongering and threats to our teachers, our nurses and trying to stop Jamaicans from having their jobs by forcing them to take vaccines,” he alleged.

VIOLATION OF RIGHTS

In response to the Government’s aim of vaccinating 700,000 Jamaicans by the end of September, the president of UIC is organising walks across the island, in protest of what it deems are the violation of the rights to freedom of movement, choice and speech.

In a baseless dismissal of the science associated with the vaccines, approved by world health bodies including the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Patterson claimed that the vaccines are fake.

“It is a fake vaccine; it’s not like your childhood vaccine, it is different, it is a new technology and we have to be careful about how we tell Jamaicans to accept this technology.”

Patterson said all Jamaicans should get a chance to talk about the vaccines in an open and objective manner, and people around the world should be allowed to freely share what they know.

Without identifying other options, he noted that there are many others and the Government should be open and honest with the people about all the other options that are available.

Prime Minister Andrew Holness has been urging eligible Jamaicans to take the COVID-19 vaccine, noting that most of the infected persons now hospitalised are unvaccinated.

“The unquestioned fact is that 99 per cent of those persons who are occupying those 700 beds ... in hospitals were not vaccinated,” Holness said.

The prime minister noted that the science suggests that the risk of an adverse or fatal outcome from COVID-19 infection is “very low” for persons who are vaccinated.

According to Patterson, the Government appears to be forcing Jamaicans to take the vaccine. He pointed to statements from members of the Government, which he said clearly indicates a move to make the taking of the vaccines mandatory.