“Vaccines are up to the person,” responded the new surgeon general. “There’s nothing special about them compared to any other preventive measure. So, absolutely. Great things about vaccines for Covid-19, prevent the risk of serious illness. Fantastic. People get to make a choice about what they want to do with that information.”

Ladapo was then asked if the state should be promoting the vaccine.

“The state should be promoting good health, and vaccination isn’t the only path to that. It’s been treated almost like a religion, and that’s just senseless, right? There are lots of good pathways to health, and vaccination’s not the only one. So we support measures for good health.”