I’ll probably wait until the pandemic is over to get the COVID-19 vaccine 💉

In recent years I’ve been getting my flu shot every year. I discovered how easy it is – you stop by the pharmacy at an off hour, like after going grocery shopping in the evening, you give them your name and sign some paper work and they jab you in the arm – last time standing up over the pharmacy counter. No ID or pharmacy card is needed once your in the system.

I fully expect that in a few weeks the COVID-19 vaccine will become available once safety testing is complete. At first it will be available to nurses, doctors, and the elderly. A few well connected politicians and wealthy will sneak in to be early in line. They always do. Early doses will be limited, you’ll have to make an appointment, maybe win a lottery, repeatly hit refresh in your browser or bribe your pharmacy friend.

I fully expect a shortage of COVID-19 vaccine when it becomes available. Everybody is going to want it. Demand will go through the roof. Every vaccination given starves the virus, the pandemic may quickly start to break once nursing homes and the elderly more generally get vaccinated. Once production those ramps up, there will be a big public push to get more people vaccinated. That’s good for everybody.

I fully envision after the vaccine is wide-spread, President Biden will very publicly get vaccinated and so will TV and music stars. The Health Department will buy television advertising promoting the vaccine, they’ll be posters for it on the buses and public buildings. People will be bragging on social media how they got vaccined after waiting for five hours in the pouring rain. There will be free COVID-19 clinics in urban areas, with lines going for blocks to get the vaccine. Pharmacies and doctors offices will packed and you’ll still have to reserve a spot to get vaccinated.

I am going to sit out the spectacle. I am not anti-vaccine but I ain’t stupid. For one waiting in a crowd increases your risk of getting the virus, and much of benefit of the vaccine is from herd immunity – if others get it your still lowering your risk of COVID. If you’re not high risk, it’s better to wait. Vaccines are often revised based on science, with the perfect dose and chemistry likely to be perfected after the first 100 million or so people are vaccinated.

It seems like for now, the leading COVID-19 vaccines work and are generally safe but may still have bugs and glitches. Probably serious side effects are rare, although I’ve heard multiple reports that the current vaccines can make people quite sick for a day or two and require multiple shots. For those at high risk, it’s probably worth it – a day of sickness, multiple appointments and sore arms – sure beats being on a ventilator for weeks. And somebody, not me, has to first.

But for me, I’d rather wait. If a lot of people get vaccinated the pandemic will break relatively quickly and the lines will dissipate at the pharmacy. The clunky, painful to get and generally crude vaccines that broke the pandemic will be replaced with refined, painless one little prick of the arm vaccines that can be gotten at the same time I get my flu shot. While the benefits of being vaccinated from COVID-19 after the pandemic are lower – it seems likely that the virus is a permanent part of the landscape and getting vaccinated late ensures that one wouldn’t get it in the out years, especially once I become older and higher risk.