To the resolute COVID-19 anti-vaxxer contingent out there, I have a cheeky suggestion: It’s time you contributed to society’s valiant effort to achieve herd immunity for the benefit of all. I don’t mean by getting vaccinated – your minds are already made up – I mean by getting sick with COVID-19. Not too sick, though; we don’t want to further burden the traumatized and weary frontline workers who have already sacrificed their mental and physical well-being caring for the sick and dying from this terrible disease. No, just sick enough, even asymptomatically, to produce the antibodies that will provide you with some immunity, despite the known risk that greater transmission often causes more dangerous variants. I don’t wish hospitalization, or ventilation, or long-term neurological and multiple organ damage, and certainly not death, upon you, although those are possibilities with which you seem to have a certain level of comfort.
Infect others! Grandma will probably survive; or maybe not. Never mind, we all have to go at some point and she’s pretty old anyways.
I already anticipate the howls of outrage at my callous perspective, and it is true, these words are not intended to indulge any sensibilities. By contrast, having a multitude of learned, accomplished, dedicated healthcare professionals imploring, pleading with you to look after your health and your life by getting vaccinated against COVID-19, in spite of your intransigence, must make you feel quite special. All that attention.
At some point, and I think we’ve reached it, the greater good should supersede the individual. So hurry up, folks. Get sick! And let’s put this deadly disease in the rear view mirror.
Elsa Benin
Chilliwack
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