For a vaccine to work, people have to take it and that is starting to look like an issue. In a survey of over 900 small and medium sized business owners commissioned by The Entourage, almost 23% of business owners said they will not take it, while a further 15% would wait a year before considering it.
A coronavirus vaccine isn’t available yet, but three are in phase 3 clinical trials and more than 125 are in development. There’s no guarantee, however, that any of them will be effective in 100% of people who get it — the best humans have accomplished is 97% to 98%, with the measles vaccine.
For the economy to have a chance at recovering, herd immunity must be achieved and the greatest hope for that is that a vaccine is tested, released and accepted. Yet the nay-sayers are growing in number.
“I’ve spent nearly 20 years in the health and fitness arena, and I have always believed in a prevention-first approach. It is beyond clear that the immunocompromised, vulnerable and at-risk in our community need to be protected, but for everyone else, we need to open the economy with a common-sense approach and focus on good hygiene and social distancing. A mandatory vaccine is un-Australian,” said Craig Schulze, Founder of The One Shot Movement.
Those who do support the vaccine see it as a crucial step for the reopening of the economy and getting everyone back to work.
“Business owners have faced so many challenges this year, and the more traction this specific anti-vaccine movement gets, the further the small business community will suffer. People want to get back to work and reinvigorate our economy, and the vaccine is the key to achieving that. My family and team will get the vaccine, but it shocks me that so many other business owners won’t,” says Kate Liedtke, owner of interior design business Catherine de Meur Interiors.
Jack Delosa, founder of The Entourage, an entrepreneurial network of 40,000 business owners, said “Our CEOs are largely pro-vaccine, but I can see both sides of the coin. As a business community, we are going to have some tough decisions ahead about who will be able to attend our in-person events when they fire back up. Our largest event, Unconvention, attracts more than 3,000 business owners every year, and having unvaccinated people in the crowd would be concerning for my team and our attendees.”
“It’s a tough road ahead for the small business community, with a lot of difficult decisions that need to be made. And as long as small business owners remain divided along ideological lines, the challenges they’ve faced this year will only be exacerbated. We need clarity, leadership around the issue and a united approach – anything short will only set us back even further,” said Delosa.
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