"Vaccine? No, thanks. Not me. Not yet."

 You don't need to be a Trump-loving, conspiracy-believing, COVID denier to be "vaccine hesitant."

     "I'm not a knuckle-dragging nincompoop. There is an idea floating around in  mainstream polite company--Peter, an idea maybe you yourself believe--that of course normal, rational people our age want the vaccine. But my wife and I are normal and rational, and we have our own good reasons to be 'vaccine hesitant.' We would like to tell our story."

David Landis

With that introduction, an old high school friend contacted me and asked to do a Guest Post. David Landis lives in Carlton, Oregon, in the Pinot Noir area south of Portland. He runs an import and logistics business connecting American consumers with Far East manufacturers. Fifty-five years ago we were in school together in an elective class called Speech and Debate. We were immersed in the policy debates of the era. That habit hasn't changed.

David was right about my assumptions. I had fallen into a way of thinking about the COVID vaccine. I had divided the world into two categories. The big one among people my age was people eager to get vaccinated and who celebrated their second shot as signifying safety and freedom. We were the rational ones, happy that modern medical science delivered life-saving vaccine. 

There was a second category of people--kooks. There were COVID-denier kooks,  who believe the whole thing was a liberal hoax. There were Live-Free-Or-Die kooks who hated anything Biden liked and were willing to die to prove it. There were inconsiderate kooks who didn't care who caught COVID from them. There were careless kooks, people who don't bother wearing seat belts. They all had in common a general resentment of the nanny state, science denial, and a strong likelihood of thinking Trump was the greatest president ever. 

David Landis was a whole different category. Not a kook. Intelligent and rational. An old friend.

Guest Post by David Landis

The demonization that those resisting taking the COVID-19 vaccination is, as is commonly the case, only partially on point.

We hear plenty about conspiracy theorists who either reject science or blindly follow their Pied Piper refusing the vaccine because the virus is a “hoax”. Some simply refuse because they demand their “freedom”. Those in these categories have their false beliefs reinforced by media talking heads in their attempts to build an audience or cash in on click bait.  

One category of vaccine critics goes mostly unheard: Those who have suffered at the hands of Big Pharma in the past. We have heard from some in the African American community who are mistrustful of the industry because of past treatment, and rightfully so.   

We don’t hear from those personally poisoned previously by drugs pushed on them. Make no mistake, physicians and pharmacists are a big part of this industry. My family experienced this nightmare and is in the “wait and see” category on vaccination because of it. 

In 2005, my wife was diagnosed with a sinus infection made without benefit of lab work. She was given a prescription for Levoquin (Levofloxacin family of antibiotics).    Within 48 hours and after 2 pills, she began a 5-year sojourn of physical and financial pain, eventually finding herself unable to take a flight of stairs. She was now officially a “long hauler”, a victim of the medical community soon to be abandoned to her misery, as is now becoming the case for COVID 'long haulers." 

Within a month, she experienced “frozen shoulders” and torn tendons. The doctor who prescribed this medication refused to take her calls. We saw others in the allopathic medical community who told her it was “in her head” and that this medication was out of the body within a few days. Perhaps, but the damage was done and she would suffer for it for years. 

The FDA gave a Black Box Warning to this drug, albeit only after serious lobbying by Public Citizen and others. But no physician or pharmacist is required to advise a patient of this warning and most aren’t aware that the Warning exists. Ruptured tendons are listed in the warning, but psychotic episodes are also common. Fluoroquinolones are poisonous, period. One look at the downward trend in prescribing this class of drug tells the tale. The industry is finally taking notice, but over a decade late for thousands.

We eventually found a solution in the naturopathic world. It took a few years of the treatment we chose, as well as daily exercises to regain shoulder motion. We spent about $30,000 to regain her health, but we were successful eventually, thanks to my wife’s persistence and a great naturopath.

To hear that Big Pharma, CDC, and our government wanted all to immediately get “poked” fell on deaf ears here. We’re waiting. Already we see that J&J’s single dose version was halted, and then restarted. We’re still waiting.

Know that the FDA is almost 50% funded by Big Pharma and has their own bread to butter. They don’t have clean hands in this or any pharmaceutical matter.

What are we doing, you ask? We are dedicated mask wearers and have been since February last year. We have not had anyone in our home for 13 months. We go to the woods or to an area of the Oregon coast where we can be alone with nature. If we order restaurant food, we eat it in the car. And did I mention that we wear masks? Everywhere.  

 We can’t control what others do, but can control our own movements and behavior. We are looking forward to the day that we can be vaccinated and feel safe. Until then we’ll do everything necessary to protect ourselves.