If your child is not vaccinated, they should be barred from attending public school

[Greyblades]

I've accepted the idea of steering action through opt-out methods.

As has been shown time and again, there are enough people in the world who would opt out, regardless of it being in thier interest, that they would provide a large enough breeding ground for the otherwise extinct diseases to produce a mutation that would make entire vaccination efforts moot.

Also, if a child wants the vaccination that is strongly recommended over the objections of the parents, then this should take preference over parental objection.

This relies on the child's desires. Children are universally deemed incapable of making informed decisions about sexual conduct. I see no reason to think that children should be able to make the same informed decision about vaccinations that children are incapable of making about sex.

Besides, children gain most of thier viewpoints by imitating the parents, even if we believe that a child was capable of making an unbiased choice about it; the parents influence would undeniably make them less likely to agree to vaccinations.

There are ways of directing that are not through compulsion and those should always be preferable.

Name one, in this issue for instance, that wont be screwed by 5-10% or so of the population refusing to cooperate.