Dispatches From the Fortress – Day 511

More and more businesses and theatres and public places are announcing that they will admit no one who is unable to show proof of vaccination. Some will accept proof of a recent negative test or some form of medical excuse. Some will not.

If you ain't been jabbed, you ain't getting into a lot of places you might want to go. For all the attempts by state and local governments to encourage or bribe people into getting vaccinated, this may be the thing that motivates a lot — maybe the majority of the hesitant — to comply.

On a couple of websites this morning, I read some interesting debates — one or two that were even calm and rational — about this. I can't link you to the most compelling one because it was on a "members only" forum but basically, one guy was saying that if you'd had COVID, you didn't need a shot because you now had "natural immunity." And another participant — an actual, for-real doctor — took that assertion apart, explaining that whatever antibodies you built up that way were less predictable and less enduring than what you got from vaccines.

He linked to this article and this article to which I can link you. Note that neither is from an anonymous "expert" or someone who may not have a whole lot of medical training and expertise. I'm getting quite tired of anti-vaxxers who say "I've researched this" when all they've done is found some clown on the Internet who thinks he knows a lot about medicine and who shares their fears.

I understand the folks who are leery because the vaccines are new and haven't been "approved" to quite the same levels as vaccines that have been around longer. I don't understand — and I may never understand — being afraid to gamble on them but being willing to gamble on not getting SARS-CoV-2. A friend of mine recently said, with regard to a "vaccine-hesitant" acquaintance we both know, "My God, he finally found a drug he's not willing to put in his body, sight-unseen."