Heather du Plessis-Allan: Did we overreact with suspending the Murupara doctor?

If you cast your mind back a few months you might remember the case of the Murupara doctor who was suspended after asking public questions about the Pfizer jab.
It’s been revealed Bernard Conlon has now been given permission to go back to his practice.
And it made me really reflect on whether it was the right decision to suspend him in the first place.
It turns out that during the six months he was suspended, the community at one stage had no doctors – only a couple of nurses.
These are some very isolated and poor communities: Murupara, Minginui and Ruatahuna.
It turns out that while he might have some controversial views on the Covid jab, he is considered a good doctor.
The local school principal Pem Bird reckons the doctor visits people at their homes after work in his own time and he’s devoted to the community having worked there for 30 years.
So was it the right decision?
I don’t think it was.
I think we overreacted a lot during the pandemic when we booted midwives out of their jobs because they wouldn’t get the jab or fired firefighters because they wouldn’t get the jab.
When actually I’d be more frightened of a house fire or a complication during birth than I am of Covid.
Aren’t you?
What’s worse?  A GP with dodgy vaccination advice, or an entire community of people with all the ailments they might have on a day to day basis in an isolated place like Murupara losing their doctor?
And in the end we’re all getting Covid anyway despite firing unvaccinated people from their jobs.
I think we overreacted.  Don’t you?

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