A pandemic of the paranoid
CDC Director Dr. Rachelle Wallensky described the current spike in Covid-19 as a “pandemic of the unvaccinated.” That is an accurate description. Unlike the amateurs that tried to pass as infectious disease experts (radiologist Dr. Scott Atlas) and those too scared of Donald Trump to contradict his imbecilities (Dr. Deborah Birx), Wallensky is a straight-shooting expert. But Wallensky speaks of “vaccine hesitancy” not to give offense lest that make the recalcitrant dig their heels in deeper. The reality is that we are long past the point when there is any sane reason for hesitancy and have entered a stage of vaccine lunacy.
Why would anybody go unvaccinated in the United States today?
Clinical trials and the real-world experience of over 161 million Americans who have been vaccinated have shown the vaccine to be safe and effective. Side effects have been few and generally mild. On the other hand, public health experts and hospital staff are reporting that between 90 and 99 percent of people with serious cases of Covid or dying of the disease today are unvaccinated. Many are relatively young and have no risk factors, such as diabetes or obesity. You do not have to be a math whiz to see that your odds of living a long, healthy life are better if you get vaccinated than if you do not.
Unlike last year when vaccines were so scarce some people sheltering in place at home spent all day calling and doing internet searches to secure appointments for the shot, today the supply of vaccines exceeds the demand. The vaccine is now almost universally available. Except for the remotest corners of the country, there are plenty of places where you can get vaccinated.
Unlike almost everything else in the U.S. healthcare system, the vaccine is free. To obtain the vaccine, you do not have to have health insurance. There may be no free lunch, but there is a free Covid-19 vaccine for you if you want it.
Why, then, are only 49 percent of Americans fully vaccinated? Why has 43 percent of the population not gotten even one dose yet? You can look at the data for yourself (US COVID-19 Vaccine Progress Tracker | Vaccinations by State | USAFacts).
A May 22 New York Times article reported on research that parsed the “vaccine hesitant” into four categories: Covid Skeptics, System Distrusters, Cost-Anxious, and Watchful.
How can you be a Covid Skeptic after the massive toll of death and disease not only in the United States but across the world in the last year and a half? Within this group, there are people who cling to the belief that Covid-19 was a Democratic Party hoax to hurt Trump’s reelection. This is purely paranoia, conspiracy theory lunacy.
System Distrusters are another matter altogether. They believe that the health care system does not treat them fairly. This is the real-world experience of many people, especially minorities, not a delusional belief. The U.S. healthcare system is not fair. The system is riddled with inequities and lack of access. Republican states and states in the South where many African Americans live have refused to expand Medicaid. To perceive that a medical system based on profit—mercenary medicine—is unfair is a rational belief. Still, because the government has taken on the financial responsibility for the Covid-19 vaccine program, this is one procedure in which the inherent unfair nature of American medicine does not operate.
The Cost-Anxious are another group who are operating under a misperception. The vaccine is free. Period. Full stop. But skepticism about this is easy to understand since, unlike in other rich countries, almost nothing in the American healthcare system is free or fair. The pandemic has increased awareness of just how unfair and inadequate our health care system really is. To avoid before the next pandemic the critical problems that come with that, we would need to revolutionize health care. The interests vested in preventing this are powerful and persistent.
The term “the Watchful” for those who are “holding out to see what kind of experience their friends and neighbors have with the vaccine before committing themselves” is a misnomer. A better term is “the clueless” who have not been paying attention to the overwhelming information about the vaccine and are instead easily swayed by the misinformed opinions of personal and Facebook friends.
By this time, we should be heading into the final round in the fight with Covid-19. Instead, the adversary is making a spectacular comeback. Covid -19 should now be winding down but instead it is surging in nearly every state, with Florida characteristically in the lead thanks in large part to the cavalier, laissez-faire attitude of Governor Ron DeSantis.
With politicians like Trump, DeSantis and other science-bashing Republican reactionaries leading the nation and many of its states, we should not be surprised by the findings of a new study. Life expectancy in the United States dropped by 1.5 years in 2020, the sharpest decline since World War II. (Life Expectancy in U.S. Dropped 1.5 Years in 2020, Largely From the Pandemic – The New York Times (nytimes.com) Nothing says more than this single statistic about the wreckage Donald Trump wrought by his last year in the White House.
