Since 25 September, children aged 13 and over have to show a corona pass for a cup of tea in the cafeteria if they want to go to the cinema with friends or go to the stadium with their father. Without scientific arguments, everyone aged 13 and older must show a corona ticket to gain access to catering, events, sports competitions and theater performances.
A long evolution has equipped homo sapiens with three lines of defense against infectious diseases: immune system, behavior and reason. Where the immune system of children is very effective against Sars-CoV-2, ratio has proven to be the weakest link. Children have more to fear from the corona policy than from Sars-CoV-2.
Children have entered a Kafkaesque world. Schools are closed, sports associations were inaccessible, face masks had to be worn in school. Guidelines for snowball fights were issued, and eventually a curfew had to further restrict the freedom of movement of the youngest generation.
After a year and a half of wandering in the swamp of non-scientifically substantiated corona measures, the corona pass has reached a new low. I’m afraid Godfried Bomans was right. “With sensible things you can stop halfway, but absurdities must be completed, because they have no other justification than their consistent perseverance.”
Limited role
A year and a half of research has made it clear that children play a (very) limited role in the spread of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. There is so much scientific consensus about few findings. Children are at extremely low risk of infection with SARS-CoV-2. The survival rate for 0-19 years is 99,973 percent. Children’s immune systems have been shown to be very effective in fighting the virus.
The fear of persistent symptoms after infection (‘lung covid’) also appears to be unfounded, as research in the United Kingdom has convincingly shown. All very reassuring for parents. In the opinion of many experts, therefore, there is no scientific justification for vaccinating healthy children.
After previously unnecessarily frightening children during the children’s press conference – “then all fathers and mothers, all grandfathers and grandmothers will get sick” – however, outgoing Minister of Health Hugo de Jonge shows himself to be a strong advocate of vaccinating children against Covid-19, a disease that affects children less than a normal flu.
De Jonge did not even hesitate to antagonize parents of 12/17-year-olds with his controversial statement “if their parents don’t want it and they do, they can make an appointment themselves at the GGD”, personally to 12-year-olds via TikTok. This corona pass for children is the next step and nothing less than vaccination compulsion. This while the Health Council has clearly indicated in its advice (dated June 29, 2021) that it is important ‘to avoid all forms of urgency’ in children.
With this measure, this caretaker cabinet has once again shown that it has little regard for the interests of the youngest generation. The devastating judgment of the children’s rights organization Kids Rights has previously been stated that children have not had any priority in corona policy. The Netherlands set “a uniquely bad example” in the world by closing schools to force parents to work from home. Now children are being used again as a means, for a questionable end.
No proof
The attitude of the microbiologists, epidemiologists and doctors in the advisory OMT is remarkable, which for a year and a half has not considered the interests of the youngest members of our society. There is no epidemiological evidence for this measure. People who have been vaccinated can also be carriers of the virus and transmit the virus, which means that all ground is lost under the idea of a corona pass.
That makes “keeping the number of infections manageable” as a justification for the corona pass a fallacy. It is striking that the RIVM site indicates that the percentage of positive tests in all age groups has been declining for months, which has continued after the start of the new school year. The lack of critical voices among our MPs once again leads to the painful conclusion that Real World Data and scientific arguments have too little expressiveness in the House of Representatives.
litmus test
In order to flourish, children need a living environment that offers them every opportunity to grow into autonomous adults who make a positive contribution to society. A corona pass for teenagers is not a sign of the pursuit of a caring society. A corona pass has nothing to do with public health. In the words of Nelson Mandela: “There is no better way for a society’s soul to reveal itself than in the way it treats its children.”
This is a litmus test for our society. The question is whether we allow our children to be thrown under the bus again. Remembering the words of former Supreme Court Justice Jonathan Sumption in a recent interview: “Sometimes the most public spirited thing that you can do with despotic laws like these is to ignore them.” (“Sometimes the best thing you can do as a concerned citizen with despotic laws like this is to ignore them”) The choice is yours.
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