evidence: In the wake of the US Supreme Court’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate rulings, medical groups and public health organizations expressed a mixture of relief and disappointment. On one hand, the nation’s highest court had upheld the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) regulation regarding vaccination requirements for health care workers. On the other hand, the justices decided that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) did not have the authority to require vaccination or masking and regular testing for employees outside the health care system. [...] Yet Jha pointed out that "vaccine mandates are as old as our country," noting that General George Washington required his troops to be inoculated against smallpox. "It’s hardly un-American to have mandates," he added. "I couldn’t send my kid to a public school and say, ‘Sorry, no polio vaccine for my kid.’" Now that the Supreme Court has ruled against broad COVID-19 vaccine requirements, however, Jha said he is "deeply worried" that people are going to start unwinding mandates for vaccines against polio and other infectious diseases.