The vaccine is here, why I haven’t gotten it yet…

Two vaccines have arrived to help with this COVID outbreak, one from Pfizer and one from Moderna. I have signed up for neither.

I know as a nurse I should be one of the first to get out there and get vaccinated. However, I still have questions that I needed answers for and only recently have I starting finding the answers. I wanted to know more about side effects, how many participated in the studies, how is the vaccine supposed to work?

There is also one other thing that has been holding me back; I am black and I have an inherent distrust of the medical system, the very system I am a part of as a nurse. Learning about things such as the “Tuskegee experiment”, seeing how many times the healthcare system has failed black women, seeing in person how implicit bias plays a role in how medical professionals treat people of color, realizing that there was only a small amount of people of color (9.8%) were actually in the Pfizer study, all make me wary.

I want to trust the science behind the vaccine. I want to trust the medical system. I want to believe in the potential of finally getting this pandemic under control. I also want to feel safe.

Just my opinion…

So today an older patient came with his grandson who was translating for him. As the grandson sat in my waiting area while his grandfather was getting his test I witnessed an awkward convo, involving another person it sounded like this:

“He looks Indian!” (referring to the patient)

“Yeah I can see that, we are from Bangladesh.”

“How do you like America?”

“😐…oh I was born here 😑. I’m 21 so America is what I know, but I like it.”

Now, the person asking about where he was from (because he just couldn’t be from here) was an older person. I know that they tend to have a very narrow view of the world. I get that. However, I really hate it when people assume that people of foreign descent weren’t born here. He literally had no accent from any other country. He spoke English as well as any “red blooded American” I have ever met. It’s a bit backwards to me to think that because someone doesn’t look “Caucasian ” or “African American” they just have to be from some other country. We are a country with a multitude of nationalities, that’s what makes things so interesting. I just wish people would maybe think before they speak.