Let’s have some fun with vax passports
There is so much COVID news to catch up on.
First of all, here in Connecticut, Gov. Ned Lamont is mulling vaccine passports. He was eyeing them for a while, but it was upgraded to mulling. He has not ruled out chewing over the whole question. It feels like we could be here a while.
We need new nomenclature. “Vaccine passport” has become a red flag for anti-vaxxer bulls. (Sidebar: Bulls do not actually perceive the color red and are enraged by the movement, not the color, of a cape.)
My suggestion: make it fun, make it peppy, make it snappy. Vaccinated folks should be issued a Jabby card that includes a photo, scannable barcode and anti-counterfeiting measures. (Bonus: A Jabby card could be used in states where a photo ID is required to vote and also for discounts at participating Red Lobsters.)
Maybe also a mascot. In 1962, the CDC launched Wellbee, a cheerful striped cartoon bee who promoted immunizations, handwashing and not taking the same medications as your horse.
Why you would choose a stinging insect when kids were already stressed about needles is beyond me, but it’s a short buzzing flight from Wellbee to Jabby.
Brazil — where the government has been eyeing/mulling/ chewing over virus curtailment for the last 19 months — they already had an immunization mascot named Ze Gotinha, which translates loosely to Joseph Droplet. Unfortunately, Ze Gotinha looks like the friendly ghost of a deceased Ku Klux Klan leader, so no thank you.
And In Japan, the most mascot-crazed society in the history of humanity, they have Koronon, a pink, anti-coronavirus cat, and a yellow and blue quarantine mascot wearing goggles and Corowa-kun, a dog who, I want to say, answers vaccination questions?
Speaking of nomenclature, Canada’s health agencies suddenly announced this week a set of new vaccine names, only one of which is pronounceable. Moderna is SpikeVax. AstraZeneca is Vaxzevria (say what now?), and Pfizer is Comirnaty. Apparently, Comirnaty has been the official brand name of the Pfizer jab for some time now, but the name was so covfefe that nobody used it. All Canadian flu vaccines will be known as Wayne.
Can we get back to the artist formerly known as Vaccine Passport? I don’t see how we can have meaningful policies without, um, Jabby cards, and Jabby needs to be national or available for implementation by any state government not currently being run by a crazy person.
Proof of vaccination requirements are popping up in workplaces, colleges, restaurants, entertainment venues, cockfights. Scottish log-tossing events, you name it.
On top of that are the new requirements and guidelines set forth by the Biden administration.
That’s a lot of verification, and that soggy paper thing in your wallet that looks like a reminder for your dental appointment in 1958 is not going to cut it.
Here in Connecticut, Republican leaders will oppose Jabby in keeping with the party’s 2021 national theme: “No Longer Embracing Common Sense.”
House Republican Leader Vincent Candelora (REeby Deeby) told NBC30 that he had carefully researched the issue by attending a Yankees game and talking to the always reliable “they.”
“Having just gone to a game in Yankee Stadium a couple weeks ago they said the rollout in New York was a complete disaster for them and they moved away from it,’ Candelora told NBC30.
Well, that settles it for me. If they can’t easily screen 45,000 people from 17 different states (including states of inebriation and arousal) entering a baseball stadium, how could a 200seat restaurant ever manage it? (Actually, Yankee Stadium does not currently require proof of vaccination in its main seating areas, except on Hacking Cough Night.)
Speaking of states of arousal, it’s time to give the award for this week’s Least Helpful Pandemic Celebrity. The uncontested winner is Nicki Minaj, who announced on Twitter that
Proof of vaccination requirements are popping up in workplaces, colleges, restaurants, entertainment venues, cockfights. Scottish log-tossing events, you name it.
she did not attend this year’s Met gala because of its vaccination requirement.
Minaj attributed her hesitancy at least partly to the plight of her “cousin’s friend” in Trinidad who experienced swollen testicles after his vaccination. (Swollen testicles are not associated with the vaccines although they can be a symptom of certain STDs. Which makes it not impossible that the cousin’s friend was trying to brush off an embarrassing case of chlamydia by blaming the jab. Please note: it is medically impossible to brush off chlamydia unless you use a special horse and goat brush purchasable from my website.)
The story was unsubstantiated nonsense which made it catnip for Tucker Carlson’s Fox News program, even though things said by foreign-born Black women are not ordinarily vaulted to places of prominence on that show.
Meanwhile, Trinidad, home of Minaj’s cousin, was forced to conduct one of the more unusual manhunts in modern memory. The country’s health minister eventually pronounced that it was “a waste of time” looking for Mr. Big.
Meanwhile Minaj has been invited to visit the White House and discuss swollen testicles with presumably the oldest-looking intern they can round up.
And that, ladies and gentleman, is a sample what we’re doing with our time these days.