COVID-19 vaccine decision isn’t an easy one. Here is what I would do
Maybe it’s the name officials gave the project. Maybe it’s our simmering discontent and deep distrust of all things Washington. Maybe it’s the sophomoric one-upmanship displayed by the president when talking about anything coronavirus.
Whatever the reason, the result is still alarming: Almost everyone I know has said they won’t get vaccinated for COVID-19. At least not in the beginning. If my conversations with friends and text exchanges with family members are any indication, the work of our scientists will be met with resounding: No way, no how, not now.
“I’m not a guinea pig,” texted one family member.
“Warp speed isn’t a concept that inspires confidence,” a friend told me. “A vaccine or a drug is the last thing you want to rush.”
“I’ll get it after the politicians and their families do.”
Those vehement rejections aren’t coming from “anti-vaxxers,” either. This group has their children dutifully inoculated against all the childhood scourges and most, if not all, get flu shots every autumn. They’re highly educated.
They believe in science.
But the mishandling of Operation Warp Speed, the ridiculously named publicprivate partnership to accelerate the development of COVID-19 diagnostics and vaccines, has fomented nothing but doubt. Someone should be thinking rebrand-rebrand-rebrand. How about Operation Safe Shot? Or, Operation Conquer Corona?
Of course, it’s more than just marketing. Our distrust of this vaccine underscores the breakdown in our essential public relationships. We have become suspicious, skeptical, cynical, weary and wary of each other. I don’t want it to be this way. I certainly don’t want to hand off this mess to my grandchildren, either.
Sure, we’re being told that we’re on the same team, that we’re all in this together, but the platitudes and hashtags ring increasingly hollow. Public health has become politicized and scripture has been weaponized. Even baseball caps (the most American of hats) have turned into identity fashion. So why not smear vaccines while we’re at it?
More than President Trump’s false narratives — and those are too many, too sadly funny, too idiotic to list here — this vaccine refusal from people across the political spectrum has pushed me into a spiral of hopelessness. I know a shot (or two) won’t be a COVID-19 cure, but it can be a powerful tool in the treatment box of public health. It’s an opportunity to return to a semblance of a normal life, but only if we’re willing to be inoculated.
How best to deal with the coronavirus is a favorite topic among those in my circle, even as the fatigue of physical distancing and the annoyance of mask-wearing takes its toll on our collective psyche. The debate turned really heated, however, when I mentioned that The Hubby and I had volunteered for vaccine clinical trials. (Are you crazy? an offspring demanded.)
No clinical trial luminary has called, but I remain undaunted in my commitment. I’ve vowed to be among the first civilians standing in line to bare my arm for the puncture, whenever that happens. As you would expect, this goal has thrown the young’uns into a state of disbelief and horror.
My circle of intimates aren’t the only skeptics, though. A Kaiser Family Foundation poll published earlier this month revealed that 62% of U.S. adults worry that White House pressure — read: political mongering — could push the Food and Drug Administration to approve a vaccine before it’s safe and effective. Other polls have shown that up to two-thirds of people won’t go for a coronavirus vaccine when it first becomes available. So disheartening!
But not only do I intend to get the COVID-19 vaccine, I’m also marching myself over to the neighborhood drugstore for the flu shot. I just wish there was a vaccine for political manipulation. We sure need one.