Covidiot is a relatively new term coined during the onset of the pandemic associated with someone who doesn’t take the virus seriously, ignores health advice from medical experts and government officials and acts in their own self-interest.
It has been used to describe people who say Covid-19 is a hoax, throw tantrums when they are asked to wear a mask or socially distance and invoke their right to freedom of movement during lockdown.
More recently it’s been used to the describe the anti-vaxxers who refuse to get behind the notion that to bring this pandemic under control, it’s going to take a high percentage of inoculated people.
When Covid-19 first hit, millions prayed for the development of a vaccine to eradicate the virus, but now that we have an assortment of jabs from Pfizer to Sinovac to provide immunity we are faced with yet another challenge.
US President Joe Biden is right on the money when he says that the highly contagious Delta variant is being exacerbated by the “pandemic of the unvaccinated”.
Biden has introduced a strict new vaccine requirement for about two million US federal workers, the nation’s largest workforce, which requires them to show proof of vaccination or be subjected to mandatory testing and masking.
Now he is offering a $100 (R1,440) incentive to those who will get vaccinated because “we all benefit if we can get more people vaccinated”. His controversial incentive comes as the US death toll soars — about 2,000 per week.
US President Joe Biden is right on the money when he says that the highly contagious Delta variant is being exacerbated by the ‘pandemic of the unvaccinated’.
At home, an article published last month in the SA Medical Journal found that vaccine hesitancy is an emerging problem, influenced by factors such as age, race, education, politics, geographical location and employment.
“One of the most consistent findings was the widespread concerns people have about Covid-19 vaccine safety and effectiveness. Much hype and media attention in SA have been placed on issues related to disinformation, conspiracy theories and occult perceptions as drivers of Covid-19 vaccine hesitancy.”
The vaccine hesitancy comes at price — both in terms of mortality and financially.
The 200 maskless protesters who waved their placards in Sea Point, Cape Town last week in support of “freedom and human rights” not to be injected, must be planning their next protest after hearing that Discovery Life aims to hit people who don’t take their jab with higher premiums, versus those who get a shot in the arm.
As Discovery Life CEO Riaan van Reenen explains, insurance is based on risk, which is informed by numbers. And their numbers say that Covid-19 adds significant risk to the health of life insurance clients across all age groups, and that people infected with the Delta variant have a 95% lower risk of being hospitalised after having both doses of the Pfizer vaccine, with significant benefits even after a single dose.
Their research also shows vaccinations are extremely effective in preventing hospitalisations: even if only 8% of a population does not get fully vaccinated, that 8% will experience more hospitalisations than the other 92%.
Cold hard facts.
Those who choose not to be vaccinated may justifiably feel punished for their choice. They may say they are in fact coerced to be vaccinated or else face financial punishment. But their argument that their democratic right to choice is being violated doesn’t exempt them from freedom of consequence.
The truth is that one of the hardest hitting lessons of Covid-19 is that our actions and choices during this pandemic have repercussions for our family, community and society. Some of us have learnt this in the most painful way as we continue to grieve loved ones, friends and colleagues.
As President Cyril Ramaphosa informed us in his weekly missive to the nation, the number of vaccinations administered in SA has now passed the 7.5-million mark and about three million people are fully vaccinated.
And with nearly 1.5-million single dose Johnson & Johnson vaccines handed over to the department of health in the past few days, and more than 5.5-million Pfizer vaccines from the US government expected to arrive on Tuesday, SA is on target to exceed vaccinating the current average of 200,000 people a day.
As Johannesburg general practitioner Dr Daniel Israel describes it, the vaccine is our “golden armour in this disastrous pandemic, and the single most effective tool we have to get our lives back to normal”.
But their argument that their democratic right to choice is being violated doesn’t exempt them from freedom of consequence.
His counter to the medical risk argument posed by anti-vaxxers is: “Have you considered the risks of Covid-19 pneumonia or being a conduit for Covid-19 pneumonia in someone else? Have you weighed those risks against the vaccine risk that concerns you?”
Israel describes the drop in Covid-19 infections in Gauteng in the past week as “the loosening of a noose around the necks of my colleagues and myself, and though we’re still diagnosing new cases daily, fear of a further exponential increase has abated”.
But this fragile homeostasis rests on our collective responsibility not to be Covidiots.
The only way we can rebuild our immunity is to realise that this pandemic is not about self-preservation or personal rights but patriotism.
Israel says that “no formidable soldier has stood at the front lines of a battleground worrying about his rights. You have a responsibility to go out there and fulfil your duty. Otherwise you may want to consider ‘staying home and saving lives’ for the rest of your life.”
And he’s right, the toll of this war has already been brutal on our population and if acting for the greater good is a chance to preserve lives, we have a moral duty and obligation to do that.
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