Aparajita Srivastava
// What stands between us and immunity? //
In late December 2020 and early January 2021, U.S. President Joe Biden started the U.S. vaccination process by prioritizing front-line and healthcare workers. He then expanded vaccination coverage to those ages 65+ and with underlying health conditions. Finally, he ended with essential workers before opening it up to all citizens. Since this past May, all Americans ages 12 and older have been eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine: either two shots of Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna’s product, or one shot of Johnson & Johnson’s. President Biden has done and is doing everything he can to end this pandemic. The only hurdles standing between the United States and normalcy are its unvaccinated citizens.
The Biden Administration recently laid out a six-step plan to fight the pandemic. Their agenda consists of: “Vaccinating the Unvaccinated, Further Protecting the Vaccinated, Keeping School Safely Open, Increasing Testing, Requiring Masks, Protecting Our Economic Recovery, and Improving Care for those with COVID-19.” Two of the six points relate directly to vaccination. For “Vaccinating the Unvaccinated,” President Biden has mandated all federal employees to be vaccinated and encouraged leaders in private companies to do the same. His administration has worked with pharmacies, such as CVS, to provide over 80,000 locations across the US for citizens to receive the shot. With the new policies, 90% of job postings now require vaccinations, and over two-thirds of the eligible population has been vaccinated.
However, the country is far from ending this pandemic. A major obstacle to herd immunity and the return to normalcy are the unvaccinated, known as “anti-vaxxers.” More specifically, those who are eligible and able to receive the shot, yet refuse to. Why?
Anti-vaxxers often cite three points in particular regarding their decisions. They argue the vaccine is unsafe, goes against their constitutional rights, and is not necessary.
Some anti-vaxxers express extreme beliefs, including the idea that there are microchips in the shot that cause harmful side effects, including getting COVID itself. However, they lack scientific evidence to support these statements.
Another common belief of anti-vaxxers is that the vaccine violates the constitutional rights protecting an individual’s freedom of choice. But in fact, no constitutional rights are being violated in President Biden’s vaccine mandates. In reality, Biden’s mandate gives companies and organizations the choice of their employees’ vaccination status, and he led by example when he mandated the shot for all federal employees, as he is the executive.
Finally, with a virus with a 97% survival rate, anti-vaxxers claim they don’t need the vaccine. However, this attitude puts themselves, but more importantly others, at risk. With COVID-19, even if one does not even develop symptoms, they can still spread the virus to those who cannot fight it.
In conclusion, President Biden’s policies are not what is keeping this pandemic from ending. If that was the truth, we would have higher vaccination rates. The problem is those who refuse to be vaccinated. To return to normalcy, the government needs to educate the public and highly encourage vaccination among the community, in addition to mandates. The issue does not lie around getting the shots to the people, but rather getting the people to the shots.
