COVID Vaccination, Part Two: The Deceptions
Dear readers, I have a question for you: What is the ONE thing that “right wing crazies,” “left wing crazies,” and “people of color” have in common?…. Answer:… they all hate the COVID vaccine. Yes, distrust, paranoia and political and philosophical resistance to vaccination unites and animates these seemingly disparate groups. I suppose it’s interesting, in a way, that they can all find “common ground” and finally agree on SOMETHING. But, as the Arte Johnson character used to say, in an hilariously stilted German accent, on the 60’s TV comedy, Rowan and Martin’s “Laugh In”: VEEEELY interesting….but SCHTUPID!”
Aside from schtupidity (as discussed extensively in my previous essay), however, are there other factors that might help to explain the the “anti-vax” movement that currently involves nearly ONE THIRD of our, supposedly, highly educated populace? How can we POSSIBLY explain refusal to accept a medical treatment that has proven safe and effective over MILLIONS AND MILLIONS of doses, against a disease that has already killed over SIX HUNDRED AND FORTY THOUSAND AMERICANS (and over FOUR MILLION people world wide)? And, ladies and gentlemen, it must be emphasized that COVID didn’t just kill these people; it killed them horribly. It basically suffocated them to death. And many of the victims were NOT old and infirm. A rather sizable group were young and healthy. In April of 2020 I had COVID myself, and I spent a week feeling like I was DROWNING. And, because I didn’t require hospitalization, I’d be considered to have had a MILD or moderate case! I shudder to think about what a severe case might FEEL LIKE to those poor souls afflicted. How, on earth, can rational and, putatively, educated people turn away from protection against such a monstrous disease?
Aside from the stupidity engendered by a dysfunctional system of education in America, I think another factors are likely at work. “Vaccine hesitancy” involves, of course, distrust. And, I believe that some of this distrust goes back to the series of deceptions promulgated, early in the pandemic, by numerous governmental and medical agencies. During the early pandemic, these sources of so-called “trusted” information, issued one pronouncement after the last that were JUST PLAIN WRONG.
First there was the amazing duplicity of China. Not the Chinese people, mind you. Recall the brave Chinese physician who posted early online COVID warnings, and who later suffered “harsh interrogation” by government officials for “spreading rumors” (He was said to subsequently have died from COVID, but I wonder…). No, the culprit is not the citizens of China, but the ruling dictators of the Chinese Communist Party, or CCP. Although many Americans seem to have forgotten it, the CCP withheld vital information that would have better informed the Centers For Disease Control, or CDC, and the World Health Organization, or WHO. As a result of Chinese misinformation, early pronouncements from these agencies were often DEAD wrong. Remember, the “disease originated in wild bats”? “It began in a wet market”? “The pangolins (ant eaters) were the intermediates?” The Wuhan LEVEL FOUR VIROLOGY LAB had “nothing to do with the epidemic”? The disease is “NOT spread person to person”? All of these lies were spewed by the CCP, with a straight face. Shameful!
Next, there’s WHO itself. This branch of the United Nations parroted all of the Chinese misinformation listed above. The politicization was so blatant that one could argue that the WHO was merely a branch of the CCP Committee for Propaganda. Remember the “No reason not to visit China”? and “China is to congratulated on doing a great job managing the pandemic” and other balderdash? Shameful!
Then, there’s the CDC. This supposedly apolitical organization regurgitated all of the misinformation listed above. Aren’t they supposed to evaluate and vet the information they are disseminating? Not only did they fail to question the Chinese and WHO misinformation, they even added a few zingers of their own: remember their “Don’t wear a mask” pronouncement? And, “Masks do more harm then good because people have to touch their face to adjust the mask”? And, “Hydroxychloroquine is ineffective and could be dangerous (all of these were subsequently proven WRONG, by the way).”
And then, there’s the Democrats. Never ones to miss an opportunity for politicization of ANYTHING, they did their best to put a “politically correct spin” on everything COVID. Remember how, in February of 2020, they said President Trump’s travel bans were “RACIST” and “XENOPHOBIC”? Remember New York City Health Commissioner Oxsirus Barbot telling people on television “Not to be afraid” and to “be sure to visit CHINATOWN for Chinese New Year”?!!! And they foisted this type of stuff on America just as the COVID case load was EXPLODING. And, then, even more reprehensibly, they downplayed that they ever said such things, and, knowing that the American populace has a VERY short memory, proceeded to blame the whole thing on President Trump, who’s instincts regarding COVID, in actuality, we’re pretty much right on the money. And, along these lines, the penultimate Democrat audacity was Biden trying to claim credit for “Operation Warp Speed” (the program responsible for allowing and supporting the amazing rapidity of COVID vaccine development and production) which was entirely a result of the wise efforts of President Trump. Shameful!
And, let’s not forget our friends in America’s “mainstream media.” These darlings not only repeated and publicized EVERY one of the deceptions enumerated above, they took it upon themselves to do there own “fact checking,” further misleading the American people. There are many examples, but, perhaps, my favorite concerns the origin of the COVID virus. Despite the fact that the supposed origin of the pandemic was a wet market just a couple of miles from one of only a handful of level four virology labs in the entire world, and despite the fact that the Wuhan Virology Lab was KNOWN to be working on corona viruses AT THAT TIME, the impossibility of such a complete coincidence was, apparently, LOST on these media geniuses. In fact, they called the people online AND in government (Senator Tom Cotton and other Republicans) who questioned the “wet market” hypothesis, what else?… CONSPIRACY THEORISTS! My favorite line, which appeared in numerous media “discussions” of the “laboratory origin” of the virus, said that such a theory had been “TOTALY DEBUNKED!” Debunked?… I don’t think so!… There are now a plethora of investigators and committees that have concluded that the “laboratory origin” hypothesis is indeed CORRECT. “Totally debunked” my backside!
Anyway, my point here is that with such a history of deceit and deception, it may not be so surprising that people take vaccine recommendations with a grain of salt, and, accordingly, this may have contributed to the “hesitancy” gripping a third of our nation, thereby delaying the onset of heard immunity and prolonging the suffering and deaths still prevalent in America. Shameful!