Senator John McGahon - speech from 2 Dec 2020

Thank you very much, Cahirlock. Deputy Leader, last week in this House I spoke about the real problem of vaccine scepticism and now I want to talk about what I would call is the real need to build confidence around vaccine confidence. Building vaccine confidence isn't just a reserve of government, it's not just a reserve of members of this House, it's a reserve of everyone right across Irish society that has a public platform, whether that's sports stars, whether that's influencers, people who have a public platform in society. But more important than ever, that same principle has to apply to the national broadcaster and it has to apply to the media at large. It is simply not acceptable that we have the media and we've seen it this week in relation and I won't care if I can mention any names but we've seen it in one specific thing this week where it's not acceptable to present the other on the hand view that's not based in reality, that's not based in fact, that's not based in a pro-science approach or data of any sort. To simply be allowed to say unchallenged that there's no scientific data to support vaccines. When Merdina released data to show that of 30,000 people tested, 15,000 people were given a vaccine, 15,000 people were given a placebo, of the people who got the vaccine, 15 people presented illness effects, of people who didn't get the vaccine, 185 did. That is clear, hard, cold clinical data. What more can you want? And to say that we don't have evidence about that is wrong. To still advocate for a zero COVID approach, which has been debunked at every single opportunity by everyone in this island of all political parties, and to say that and not to have that challenged, that's wrong as well. So there has to be a huge level of responsibility, not just from people in this house, from people in the media, and right across Irish society, to build vaccine confidence. And quack ideas like this cannot be left unchallenged as we build that confidence. Thank you.