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Every Reason Why Getting Vaccinated Is Better than Getting COVID-19
When 91-year-old Margaret Keenen became the first person worldwide to receive the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine in December 2020, the public sphere erupted with applause.
The event was documented as a groundbreaking step forward in our common fight against the coronavirus pandemic — and rightly so. Scientists around the world had been working tirelessly together to develop a vaccine that would serve as one of our best defences against COVID-19. And finally, we had it.
We had a feasible means to end the pandemic that plagues us — but Western society took it for granted.
While the governments of high-income nations flaunted their wealth for the best buyouts of Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca supplies, members of our own communities — our families, friends and neighbours — gambled in the high-stake bet of my-body-is-better-than-yours, ultimately choosing not to get vaccinated, despite the overabundance of doses our countries have secured at the expense of lower-income nations.
Similar to the all too familiar not-in-my-backyard phenomenon, which prevents safe injection facilities from being built in the innercity spaces where they’re most needed and systematically inhibits low-income families from sending their children to schools equipped with the best educators…
