High school junior Nicolas Montero stays busy. He runs track, works night and weekend shifts at Burger King and keeps on top of his schoolwork at Neshaminy High School in Bucks County, Pennsylvania.
But Montero’s packed schedule is also strategic — he says it’s a way to stay out of the house.
Montero and his parents are separated by a political and cultural rift common throughout the U.S.: He says his parents are part of a small but vocal minority who oppose COVID-19 vaccination and have refused to let him get the shots.
“The thing about these beliefs is that they alternate by the day,” said Montero, who is 16. “It’s not one solid thing that they’re going with, so it’s just really baseless. It’s like one thing they see on Facebook, and then they completely believe it.”
The impasse eventually led to an act of quiet defiance: Montero traveled to Philadelphia, where a little-known city regulation permits children age 11 or older to be vaccinated without parental consent.
Read more at NPR.