[Urgent Deadline] Tell the CDC Not to Limit COVID Vaccine Booster Availability
You have until tomorrow (September 8, 2023) to submit your public comment to the CDC regarding updated COVID vaccine availability, which they’re considering limiting to only people over the age of 75 and immunocompromised people like me. This is unacceptable. Please click the link and submit your own letter. I’m sharing my own letter below.
I have Sjogren’s, which is an autoimmune disease that grants me the unfortunate label “immunocompromised.” I also have to take two different immunosuppressant drugs. I’m scheduled for surgery on Monday, September 11, and I had to BEG for the hospital to have everyone who will be taking care of me wear N95s. I was literally on the phone with them a few hours ago with the woman on the phone asking why I wanted them wearing N95s instead of regular surgical masks, as if we’re not in the midst of another unnecessary surge of an airborne virus that is still a global pandemic. A hospital questioning me, the patient, about why I want them taking proper infection mitigation protocols! My surgeon hadn’t bothered to tell them that I was immunocompromised, so now they have me noted for reverse isolation protocols.
But this basic lack of understanding of infection control happening at medical facilities is only part of the problem. The CDC certainly understands that vaccinating only “vulnerable” individuals during a pandemic is not enough. Why are such half-measures even being discussed? We need MOST of the population vaccinated in order to reduce disease transmission, viral load, and incubation time during which the virus can further mutate. My master’s degree is not in medicine or public health, but I know how to read scientific papers, and there is no question about what will be necessary to stop the pandemic and prevent further unnecessary deaths and permanent disability. (I developed Sjogren’s as a post-viral sequelae following an EBV infection 24 years ago. I don’t need another in the form of “Long COVID.”)
Stop practicing eugenics by making it the individual responsibility of “vulnerable people” to avoid getting COVID. Your entire job is DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION. You KNOW that public health doesn’t work that way. You KNOW that high-quality respirators should be worn by EVERYONE to minimize transmission. You KNOW that up-to-date vaccines should be regularly administered to EVERYONE to minimize transmission and protect against severe illness in even “healthy” people. You KNOW that indoor air quality improvements are necessary for all public spaces to prevent the spread of airborne viruses, of which COVID is only one. You KNOW that it would be less expensive for the government IN THE LONG RUN to protect the populace from disease and disability, because otherwise, there won’t be enough healthy, able-bodied people to perform labor to keep society running in another decade or two. Before the pandemic, 1 in 4 people were disabled. With everything we know about post-COVID sequelae, what will it be soon? 1 in 3 people? 1 in 2?
Bring back mask mandates. Establish vaccine mandates like there are for other diseases like tuberculosis and polio in order to participate in public society, like children attending public school or adults working in healthcare and/or the public sector. Stop making public health measures optional. What do you even exist for if not to actually stop the spread of COVID and other diseases? How many more people like me have to die or become permanently disabled? It was hard enough isolating at home to avoid unnecessary exposure in public when the mask mandates were still in place. Now it’s not even safe to seek emergency medical treatment. If wastewater studies show that 1 in 55 people in the US have COVID now, that ratio is going to be more concentrated in healthcare settings. Every infection is on your heads, every death, every new disability. Do the right thing. Better late than never.
