Written 13 December, 2020
My dear friend Sarah from the UK rang. She works in a hospital, and after much to-ing and fro-ing, Boris Johnson has decided the staff need the vaccine. This is the Pfizer vaccine, with data as yet unpublished. No doubt he’s bought it against the advice of his scientists, to show the world that the Brits could do it first. He bought it, as Norman Swan says, on a press release. Sara tells me there’s much chest-beating- ” we did it first” – but Sarah has an autoimmune disease, and has decided against. Her colleagues are giving her dirty looks. She’s followed Norman Swan, who says Australians are lucky, because we have the luxury of waiting and seeing. But Sarah doesn’t.
You’re putting yourself at risk because they’ll be careless. They can still get the infection, because the vaccine doesn’t stop the infection, just the disease.And they can pass it on.
But I’ve been at risk all year.
Can you take off a few months?
I’ll get the sack.
I’m worrying about her as I finish my last PhD student’s manuscript. I worry about her as I gurney the decks, a long job I promised myself as soon as I sent away my manuscript.
The deck glows in the dusk. That’s done. But Sarah?
