Protests Over Vaccine Mandate Near Silver Cross

NEW LENOX, IL — A small but passionate group protested across from Silver Cross Hospital in New Lenox Friday against Gov. J.B. Pritzker's recent vaccine mandate, which requires all health care workers and teachers to be vaccinated against the coronavirus by Oct. 4 or submit to weekly testing for the virus.

The group held signs promoting freedom of choice for the vaccine and supporting "bodily autonomy," as cars and trucks drove past on the highly-traveled Route 6 and Cedar Crossings Drive intersection near the Interstate 355 tollroad.

"We’re standing up for our right to choose what we put in our bodies instead of being forced," said Alexandrea Carlson, one of the protesters. "It doesn't have anything to do with whether or not you’re for or against the vaccine; it’s strictly whether or not you have the choice to get it. We don’t feel like anybody, whether in health care or not, should be forced in to something that has to do with their own body."

Another of the protesters, Alexandra Radulovic, echoed that idea of freedom to choose.

"We’re taught as baby nurses to always respect the decisions that our patients make, whether religious or personal, regardless of whether we agree with them or not," Radulovic said. "And I feel that individually, and as with human rights, it’s our right to choose what we put in our body."

She also stressed that the protests were not specifically against vaccines but, rather, had more to do with the unknowns about the coronavirus vaccines.

"Of course no one here is against the idea of vaccination," Radulovic said. "We are just not comfortable with putting something in our body that doesn’t have enough evidence-based research behind it

"... We haven’t had enough time to know the common side effects [of the vaccine]. If you got the vaccine, good for you. If that’s the sense of security that gets you through [the pandemic], absolutely good for you. I promote it. But, for me individually and the people here, we’re not comfortable with it."

Carlson added that the protest would let others know that people are fighting for them.

"I just want to get it out there that there are people who are willing to stand up for your rights and your option to choose," she said. "As a patient, you have that right, and as an individual — whether or not you work for a company [that would require the vaccine] — you should still have that right."

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