How Anti-Racism Leads To Discriminatory Care

This month marks the one-year anniversary of a thoroughly woke – and truly disturbing – healthcare policy. In April 2021, Vermont put racial discrimination at the center of the state’s COVID-19 vaccination rollout. It’s worth remembering what happened, so we can work to ensure it never happen again.

In the early days of COVID-19 vaccines, the most vulnerable populations were put at the front of the line. The main focus was on the elderly, and Vermont was no exception: People age 50 and older were initially able to register for vaccines. Then radical ideology got involved.

Vermont Governor Phil Scott announced that individuals who are BIPOC – which stands for “Black, Indigenous, or a Person of Color” – could register for the vaccine as young as 16 years old, while everyone else wasn’t eligible unless they were much older. It was a clear-cut case of doling out a critical treatment on the basis of skin color, not medical need. That’s exactly the kind of discrimination that “anti-racism” requires. It left fewer vaccines for the most vulnerable Vermonters.

The media lauded this backwards policy, saying things like “it’s not even that big of a deal,” while the Governor labeled opposition to the policy a “racist response.” Yet what’s actually racist is making skin color the determining factor in whether someone gets potentially life-saving treatment.

Activists are demanding exactly that, and not just with COVID vaccines. Americans of all races should oppose such discrimination for the sake of their own health.