While Jurgen Klopp is not universally beloved, he is extremely popular and certainly many more people like him than don’t. Likewise a strong majority of the population has received or will received the covid-19 vaccine.
But not everybody, as you still have some numbers of people out there who are anti-vax or vaccine hesitant. These people, via their own personal choices, are endangering the rest of us, and Klopp has pointed that out, by comparing them to those who engage in drunk driving.
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“If I say I am vaccinated, other people say: ‘How can you tell me I should be vaccinated?’ It is a little bit like drink-driving,” Klopp said ahead of today’s crunch clash at home against Manchester City.
“We all probably were in a situation where we had a beer or two and thought we still could drive but [because of] the law, we are not allowed to drive so we don’t drive.
“But this law is not there for protecting me when I drink two beers and want to drive, it’s for protecting all the other people because I’m drunk and we accept that as a law.”
That is sound reasoning from the German, who said his team is 99% vaccinated, and that he didn’t have to convince a single person to go get the shot. Klopp also rejected the popular misnomer that getting vaccinated inhibits freedom.
“I don’t understand why that is a limitation of freedom because, if it is, then not being allowed to drink and drive is a limitation of freedom as well,” Klopp added.
“I got the vaccination because I was concerned about myself but even more so about everybody around me. If I get [COVID-19] and I suffer from it: my fault. If I get it and spread it to someone else: my fault and not their fault.”
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank, partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “Transatlantic Passage: How the English Premier League Redefined Soccer in America” and “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” has regularly appeared in WGN, Sports Illustrated and the Chicago Tribune.
He co-hosts the After Extra Time podcast. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.