Should we shame the anti-vaxxers? That can only backfire | Emma Brockes

If they're dumb enough not to get the vaccine, let them get sick,' some thought. Now we know everyone would suffer

An email arrived from my cousin this week outlining how bad Covid cases are in her part of South Africa. Delta is surging, she wrote; their friends and neighbours were starting to die. Meanwhile, vaccination rates were terrible, with less than 5% of the population fully vaccinated. After filling me in on the rest of the family news, she assured me that she and her husband were on the waiting list for vaccines - for what it was worth. Her husband, she said, was convinced they're not safe".

This was information to me. Not that a member of my extended family differed from me in his thoughts about drug trials and government-agency approval, but more broadly: wow, I had no idea my cousin was married to a lunatic.