Mandatory Swine Flu Shots For Firefighters?

Let me start off by saying as a volunteer firefighter, I will resign before I take this injection. Firefighters could be added to the list of those mandated to take the dangerous and untested H1N1 vaccine if Parkersburg Fire Department Chief Eric Chichester gets his way, while health workers in Ontario Canada have been told they will not be forced to take the shot.


Firefighters do not work in hospitals, but because they are trained EMT’s, Chichester believes they should get both the seasonal and H1N1 vaccines.

“I plan on getting vaccinated as soon as it’s available,” Chichester said. “Our guys have the choice of getting the regular flu shot, but I’m looking into ways I can make it mandatory for them to receive the H1N1 vaccine,” he told the News and Sentinel.

Capt. Rick Woodyard with the Wood County Sheriff’s Department is quoted in the same article as saying that police will follow the orders of FEMA if there is a widespread H1N1 outbreak.

According to Woodyard, this would involve “guarding injection sites and helping out the medical community.” Whether “helping” the medical community means helping them to carry out forced injections remains to be seen, but it seems there would be little else for law enforcement to do in such a situation other than compel people to follow orders they wouldn’t normally be inclined to.


While health workers across the U.S., notably in Atlanta and New York, are being forced to take the swine flu vaccine as well as the seasonal flu shot or be fired, officials in Ontario Canada have stated that neither health professionals or the general public will be forced to take the vaccine.

Premier Dalton McGuinty told CBC News that the government cannot, “hold anybody down and inject them with a vaccine when they don’t want it.”

Similarly, schools in the U.S. and Canada are making noises indicating that the swine flu shot will not be forced upon children without parental consent. Asotin County Health District Administrator Joe Lillard signaled that kids in Idaho would not be forced to take the vaccine when he told local news channel KLEW-TV 3, “This is not mandatory, it is a voluntary program,” said Lillard. “I strongly encourage parents to get their children immunized, but that’s a personal choice and if they decide they don’t want to do it, it’s their decision.”

However, all this could change if H1N1 returns as a deadlier strain and begins to claim more fatalities, which is exactly what authorities seem to be preparing for as reports of military roadblocks and martial law training drills continue to pour in from all over the country.