Comments welcome. Norms apply.

When I went to get my vaccination (my first one) a couple weeks ago, after I got my shot I was shown to an observation room. 

I didn’t mind. I found my place in the corner, pulled out my phone, and alternately browsed my messages and engagements on LoR (and, yes, watched contour tutorials on YouTube), and also did a bit of people watching. 

It was a great cross section. People on what was probably their lunch break (although, let’s be real–they were gonna be late. The entire process took a lot longer than 30 minutes), retirees, students. All filed in quietly, found a socially distanced seat, and waited to see if boils, or short breath, or a sudden impulse to do the Achy Breaky would strike them before their fifteen minute observation was up. 

I have good news and bad news to report: while I was there, there were no adverse reactions to report; no one clutched their throats or sprouted lesions. The bad news is that no one was inspired to do the Achy Breaky; I know, because I stayed another 10 minutes after I was released, in a futile hope of seeing someone channeling Billy Ray Cyrus; alas, the observation room didn’t turn into a line dancing floor. I mean, I would have totally joined in. But, no. Calm reigned at Kaiser Permanente.  

The room was monitored by a woman who, every 5 minutes or so, let the people who had been in observation know that their required 15 minutes were up and that they could leave. She had a phone, and tissues, and a willingness to make small talk with us. 

I listened in. Most of the conversations were benign; where is a good place for lunch after this? Will we get orange juice and snacks? (Sadly, no.) Of course, the most important query: where is the restroom? All in all, normal people in a nondescript room, waiting it out with an ‘average’ woman monitoring our reactions. 

But one conversation stuck with me. The monitor, who was a Black woman (as were most of the women doing ‘monitor’ work; keeping us in lines, handing us clipboards, pointing us to the rooms where we got our shots) engaged in conversation with another Black woman, and the conversation turned to their adult children. My ears turned up to maximum gain when they shared their children’s struggles with their workplaces; one was a delivery driver; the other worked in a grocery. Both were vulnerable, as they had to deal with customers both inside and outside stores. Both had had what seemed like symptoms of Covid. 

Both continued working. 

There may have been formal protections for these workers; protocols that look so good on glossy posters with bullet points. Posters that urged workers to stay home if they felt sick. Posters that said that their health was of paramount importance. Posters which reiterated how valuable their work was, and how important they were. 

But these dulcet words broke down in the real world. 

I listened as one of the mothers told of her son being threatened with losing his job if he stayed home because he felt ill. The other mother told of her son having to buy his own protective equipment. 

Neither of their sons had been vaccinated. This may be less true two weeks later, as San Diego lifts age and priority restrictions, and pop up sites open up to the public.

But at the time of the conversation, they stayed unprotected. Neither son got to wait in a pleasant beige room. Neither son got to have the feeling of relief and of safety that I felt, even as I was mildly inconvenienced by the lines; by the redundant forms I had to fill out, by the lady who had a bit of a time verifying I was indeed a Kaiser member (Since 1981, yo. OG). 

They, like the temp worker (you could tell by the red badge) probably had no health insurance. Probably had to wait for free sites to pop up. 

Questions abound. Why are employers not vaccinating their front-line workers onsite? Why are they willfully putting them in harm’s way, particularly now when vaccines are widely available, at least here in San Diego? Was the woman monitoring my health vaccinated? By Kaiser? Why is her health subordinate to my own? Were the custodial workers (Kaiser contracts out; particularly in a leased short term facility specifically procured for vaccinations, as this one was, the janitorial staff are absolutely not Kaiser workers) who clean up the detritus of people coming in to insure safety for themselves (but who may be silent and asymptomatic carriers of the virus), who empty trashcans and wipe down sinks and clean toilets–are they protected from we with Kaiser cards? Kaiser cards carry benefits–but they don’t render us invincible or invulnerable–nor do they render us safe. Has this been forgotten? Or disregarded?

As more and more American residents get vaccinated, there is a dividing line; a new and cruel strata being created; those with cards they can proudly flex showing that they are safe (or, more accurately safer, or at least safe-ish; new strains are developing that the current vaccines may or may not address), and those who have done the most for the country, keeping us fed and clean and safe, disproportionally Black and brown, are absolutely on the wrong side of that line. 

At the County office where I worked until I retired from there in October, there was and is a skeleton crew. Measures (neither quick enough or comprehensive enough, true, but still) have been taken to ‘maximize safety’ for those workers. Shields have been set up; no more in person appointments; sanitizer everywhere you look (welp. Until it runs out. Then bring your own). 

But. 

When I ventured into that office for the last time in late October, to pack up the cubicle I had not lived in since April, I did notice the (contracted) cleaning staff on my way out. Masks, yes. Cheap, easily punctured gloves, maybe. But janitorial work is physical work, and it is hard to breathe. And, arguably, the flimsy masks that are good enough for my twenty-minute run to the grocery store, may well not be at all good enough for the work that they do. They have more to do than ever. Sanitizing every surface that the office workers touch. Double cleaning the bathrooms. 

But. 

The County offers flu shots to every employee every year; well, to every ‘real’ worker. Temps, who do the same thing as regular employees, were not eligible. Neither were contract workers. I imagine if the County offers Covid shots, the same restrictions will apply. 

Those who need it most will be left out. 

This issue goes far beyond the observation room or the office park. How we decide who is worth saving; who is worth the sigh of relief as they get poked, who is left to reluctantly sacrifice on our behalf is a conversation that we need to have. 

We have talked about food deserts. Now, let’s talk about vaccination deserts.

And we will in the next installment. Stay tuned. 

Comments welcome. Norms Apply. 
Join us in The Bistro for discussion!