Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine - COVID-19: The Final Mile

Episode Date: January 5, 2021

OK, so the COVID-19 vaccine is here, basically, kind of, but how do you get it? How does your Nonnee get it? How will anybody get it? The answers are ... well, they're a lot less clear than we'd like. This week on Sawbones, we'll equip you with the best information we have in the hopes of reaching herd immunity (and Nonnee immunity) just as quickly as possible.Buy The Sawbones Book paperback!Music: "Medicines" by The Taxpayers

Saw bones is a show about medical history, and nothing the hosts say should be taken as medical advice or opinion. It's for fun. Can't you just have fun for an hour and not try to diagnose your mystery boil? We think you've earned it. Just sit back, relax, and enjoy a moment of distraction from that weird growth. You're worth it. that weird growth. You're worth it. Alright, talk is about books. One, two, one, two, three, four. We came across a pharmacy with a toy and that's lost it out. We were shot through the broken glass and had ourselves a look around.

Some medicines, some medicines that escalate my cop for the mouth. Hello, everybody, and welcome to Sobo. It's a metal tour of misguided medicine. I am your co-host, Justin McAroy. And boy, does it feel good to be in 2021? And I'm Sydney McAroy. I would like to remind you that time is an artificial construct. And that is not now, Sydney. That is not not Sydney. That is not how you actually feel.

You said to me yesterday, you said, I said, you know, I know it's just a day rolling over counter, but you said, you know, you said, tell people. I said, I said that it may just be a symbol, but symbols are important to the human brain. And I have a human brain. There it is. Yes. Now I was just being a contrarian. I don't be a contrarian. I don't be a contrarian.

We haven't only left that in 2020. This is 2021. It's a bold new future. It's just early and the kids were very loud this morning. Oh my god, they were so loud. Were they especially loud? They were especially loud. Or we drink especially too much champagne last night. There's too much champagne last night.

And in 2021, our children, it turns out their volume got turned up. Is it a holiday? They're living out loud. It was a holiday for Burger King this morning when I tried to go through the drive through it's Burger King for Taco Bell. But it's not a holiday for solbos. We don't get to take a break, except for last week when we took a break, but not now.

Not like Jolly pirate donuts, which was not, it was not a holiday there. Never a holiday there. No. No. No. As they said on their Facebook page, they are open all the time, except for Christmas and Thanksgiving. But other than that, you want your, if you want your Jolly pirate fix, you can go get it there. Listen, it's a, we're, why are we so giddy? Well, it's not just because it's 2021, although that is part of it. It's because the, you know because we're wrapping up COVID.

That sounded bad to me, or to say it. We're not, okay, I think that there's a way to talk about it. That's accurate, I agree with you, say, we're not okay. I think that there's a way to talk about it that is both optimistic and realistic. I think you can be both at once. It is true that the vaccines are, that's a huge, hopeful thing that is happening, that is moving us towards a time where we can put this in our rearview mirror.

But it is also very accurate that we are quite in the middle of it still. The fact that we are in it does not negate the fact that we can see the end of it. No. And the fact that we can see the end of it does not negate the fact that we aren't in it. Two things are true simultaneously. Yes, because even though- It's like Taylor Swift said, I was happy. I was happy before I was happy.

You made me happy and I was happy after you. Both these things can be true. Something like that. You know what I love? I love to hear you quote Taylor Swift lyrics that you heard me try to quote after I heard Riley quote them. It's a game of telephoned. It's a game of telephoned.

It's a game of telephoned. It's a game of Taylor phone. We're playing. It's a classic party game, Taylor phone. We wanted to talk a little bit before we, this is sort of like, I know it's our first upset of the new year. In my head, it was also like closing of the old year. Right.

We've talked a lot about COVID and I'm not saying we're never going to talk about it again, because again, it's not over. It ain't over. And there may be new things to address. I would like us to be able to also do some more regular, not regular. That's all right. We're not going to say like our kids say regular. We're going to try to say regular in 2020.

Yeah, we got in the bad habit of saying regular the way our kids say it, which is regular. Because it's so cute. It's really cute, but then we just started doing it like when the kids weren't in the room and it was just just talking to other adults Also Charlie now says regular so yes, she is moved on So that's our niggas resolution and we look weird, but anyway I do want to do some of those but I we I've gotten a ton of questions About and Justin you've asked me some of these and also people that I know and love and and work with and all of us have been asking a ton of questions about how do I get the vaccine? Like what is happening? We've

seen a lot of news reports about the vaccine rollout not going as well as it should. Maybe some people not uptaking as often as you like them too. So a lot of hesitancy and then a lot of, I do want the vaccine, but I can't find a way to get it. And then we're hearing these really wild stories about people intentionally destroying vaccine. The vaccine. And then, yes, we will talk about what happened in West Virginia. Oh boy, how do you say national news?

When a great reason to get on the radar. So embarrassing. But I think, and I'm not gonna have all the answers to these questions just to preface because there aren't, I don't think there are answers to some of these questions. I don't think people know yet. So this was the conversation that Sydney and I had.

We wanted to do an episode where I was like, said, we had this wild experience with, I mean, do you wanna talk about the experience with GPD and have that, because that made me really think like, I kept asking these questions and she kept saying like, we don't know. I don't know, we don't know, there is not a plan. And I thought, well, let's equip people

with at least as much as you, a physician knows, maybe at least there'll be a little bit better equipped. So the situation that happened here is, I think sort of in the middle of the day, a lot of our county health departments got a shipment of vaccines that the governor had decided were slated for people who were 80 and over and not in some sort of long-term care

or a nursing home facility, something like that. And the health departments had to figure out how to get messaging out very quickly to everybody like that day. Like that day, like that moment. We have this vaccine. Here's who qualifies for it, come get it. And unless you were pain really close attention

to one that the governor had made this announcement in the middle of the day. And two, that your local health department had the vaccine and was allowing people who were 80 and above to come get it. If you weren't tuned into those things, you would have no idea. So because I was tuned into those things because I have been looking for those things, I was able to contact my grandfather, grandpa Dan, who is 87 and say, hey, they have this vaccine. And the other thing is they were so intent like we need to get these out as quickly as possible,

which is good. That should be everybody's attitude, that they were staying open past business hours to continue to hand out the vaccine, which is not something you would necessarily know that was going on. but because of this, my grandfather drove down to the health department, walked in and said, hey, do you have vaccines? They were like, absolutely, come on back. You're 87, you get one, and you got vaccinated. In the evening, after they should have closed,

so like, this just isn't stuff that you would know to do if you weren't like, keyed in, pain attention, following and looking for this kind of thing to happen. But the whole process of that seemed so wild. Yes. Like that is not, surely this was not the plan. And so then you start trying to figure out

what is the plan, and I think the answer is there wasn't a plan. I know at other health departments, and all I know is our state. I don't know what's happening elsewhere in the country, but I know at one of the other county health departments, they received their doses. They put out word via social media that they had these doses, but the way that they worded it apparently left out the very important fact that they were only for people 80 and above. So that health department had like a line around the block of people who wanted the vaccine

just anybody. And so I think they just ended up giving it out to whoever showed up because they felt so bad because the messaging was their fault. So anyway, the point is. Yeah. And there's another factor to consider, which is something I have called the frosty effect. Can I tell you the frosty effect, please? Okay, imagine that you got a hundred frosties

and your parents were like, give these out to old people, right? So you gave them to the first 70 old people that you found. Well, now I have 30 frosties, and the folks, let me tell you some about frosties that somebody who has kids, you can't rephrase a frosty. No, this is true. It don't kids, you can't re-freeze in frosty. No, this is true.

It don't fly, you can't re-freeze it. And if you melt, it's not frosty anymore. It's something far more perfect. So you have 30 frosties. If you start giving those to people who are old, you're not wasting the frosty frame, but because you can't re-freeze them. So there's also this question of like,

okay, well, we have these doses, they're unfrozen. We found 70 old senior citizens to give them actually, shouldn't say old people. 70, 80 plus people to give them to. We have 30 doses like, and I think that's gonna be because this rollout is so whatever it is that that will be an ongoing thing. Like, hey, there's just some doses.

They are going to go to waste otherwise. Well, I think that the frosty metaphor is really app because they are cold and they are getting thawed and then they do have to be used. And I think the only thing I would add to that is if there was some sort of important protective effect that happened when enough people ate frosties, that's the other thing.

Everybody who eats a frosty is improving, like, we're all protected by the people who got frosty. Just say, like, happiness. Just like, we're all a little bit happier no matter who gets a frosty, you know? The average level of happiness. Teachers says anytime someone eats a frosty, they'll get to twings. So, and like I said, I don't know if it's just our state, but it seems from at least the national news articles that the rollout is not going exactly as well. I don't follow the COVID thing in a lot of states as have you. There's a lot of states getting back while I guarantee what's written to you, something the only one

is getting a little silly with this. So there's the problem of, I don't think there was a distinct plan. And I think that things are sort of happening quickly and strangely. And I think there's also, there are a lot of people who are refusing it, which is pushing like, we're going further down lists than maybe we expected to so soon.

So like we had, I will say like, for all that criticism, the hospitals have a plan and are going through it very systematically. You know, that everything seems to be... For example, for their staff, you mean? Yeah. And it seems to be rolling along just fine, like very smoothly.

I was contacted very promptly about getting my vaccine, although I obviously did not go get it because I've already had the AstraZeneca vaccine through the trial, I'm in. But it's been very smooth. Because the other part of this that's important for all the states is not only not wasting doses, which is obviously crucial. The way it works is if your state is not using up your allotment of vaccines from week to week, then the next week's allotment will be smaller. They're not just going to keep sending vaccines to West Virginia so that the governor can stockpile them along with all of the care funding that he has stockpiled.

That's a little political humor for West Virginia, West Virginia listeners. They're not just going to keep doing that so that Jim Justice can keep them in his basement. And they won't do that for any other shade either. So if you're not using them, you're not gonna get so many, and that's bad, right? Bad. So it's important we use them. Yes. So what is available right now?

That's the first question. What vaccines are available? I got this. Pfizer and Moderna. Yes. In the US, AstraZeneca has got approval in the UK, but not Europe. Yes, that is correct.

And not here yet. There was a story from some official, the guy who's in charge of Operation Warp Speed. Said AstraZeneca wouldn't get approval in America, which is the vaccine that America has bought into the hardest, right? That was the one we initially bought by far the most doses of AstraZeneca. And they're saying that. And they're saying that on stuff. Slowy, I believe. I'm saying that will be approved to April.

That said, we're going to have a new administration in January, so let's see how that goes. And it's ultimately up to the FDA, which is an independent body in theory. So that hopefully, I hope that that is sooner. I hope that timet sooner. I hope that time table gets moved up. We do. Because that is also the vaccine. The Moderna Pfizer vaccines, while great and very effective and very safe, and I totally endorse both of them,

a benefit of the AstraZeneca slash Oxford vaccine, whichever you prefer to call it, is that it can be stored in a refrigerator. And so it will be a lot easier to get to. We don't have the frosty effect there. It will be a lot easier to get to. We don't have the frosty effect there. Yes, it will be a lot easier to get to remote parts of the country and the world. Yeah, it's cheaper and it's easier for, I mean, we live in a rural state. That's important. It's not just, you know, when you, there are parts of the US that need these to.

Anyway, so those are the vaccines that are available. They're coming in shipments to usually there are assigned distribution sites within your state and it's usually hospitals health departments are probably getting them as well and then there may be other medical facilities like nursing homes long-term care facilities that are getting them. So that is the plan. And there were assigned distribution sites in each state. Now, as far as who assigned them, it's going to be state-by-state. Like, everything at this point, like, there were the CDC guidelines where they came out and said, here's who we recommend you should get it to. Okay. Okay. Everybody over 16. And here's the order that we recommend. Okay. Okay. First, healthcare workers. Then it kind of moves into everybody who's over a certain age

and frontline workers and essential work like it all starts to mingle together. Because we have these, we have multiple goals. We want to protect the most vulnerable who are elderly and people with underlying chronic health conditions. But we also want to preserve our healthcare workers who have the most exposure. But we also need to maintain essential infrastructure. That's all of our essential workers and services, right? And so we're trying to meet all of those goals, recognizing

that they're all essential. They're all a priority. How do you rank one above the other? Which is why the CDC set out. Here are our recommendations and you can interpret them in a way that best suits your community. And whenever you do that in the United States of America, things get buckwild because each state is interpreting it in their own way. Each county is interpreting it in their own way. Each county is interpreting it in their own way. I would say each business, each hospital, each facility is interpreting that in their own way. There are a lot of interests that start to get,

that become part of the equation. There were people who argued, I think Nate Silver was one of the most prominent voices that we should be like from a statistical standpoint, we should just go age down, like start at our oldest citizens and keep moving down as people will take it based on the idea that they have the highest mortality from COVID. What you have to balance that against though is that if you have someone who has been

like self-isolating, even if they are high risk, and if you have someone who has been like self isolating, even if they are high risk, and if you have a healthcare worker who is younger and perhaps at lower risk, but they are constantly in contact with people who have coronavirus, who is the most care. Because the other thing is, if all of your healthcare workers get sick or are quarantined, who takes care of everybody, there's a whole other problem. We're also not just vaccinating people so they don't die. We're vaccinating people to stop the spread of coronavirus and get to a point where it's manageable for us as a society.

Right. It's like you said, the frosty is making everybody happy. Exactly. So we need everybody to have a frosty. So with all that in mind, I want to talk about A little bit about what is going wrong, but also what you can do I want to empower you with a few things. I don't have all the answers because no, I don't think anyone does But I think that there are some things you can do to be proactive if you want to protect yourselves and those around you But before we do that, we got to go to the building department. Let's go. The medicines, the medicines that ask you let my God for the mouth. Okay, said, I equip me for this hard-scrabble future

where I'm just cruising the street, yelling vaccines, anybody got vaccine. So here is a really easy thing you can do. The reason that our all of our county health departments were scrambling to try to hand out these doses of Moderna vaccine that they got to people 80 and above is because they didn't have like I said it came in the middle of the day and nobody knew exactly how to get the word out to the right people that a vaccine was available. If you go on Facebook, your county,

your local health department probably has a Facebook page. And it's probably weird. It's probably run in such a way that this is not seem like how a regular Facebook page will be run. That is my guess. I would follow it. Where are you? I am now following all of our local health departments on Facebook, although County is surrounding me because there are a lot of people I'm trying to look out for.

So follow all those Facebook pages. They have websites, I mean, certainly, but I don't know again, um, County Health Department websites don't always get updated constantly. So, um, something like a Facebook page or if they have a Twitter account, that'd be a cool health department. I don't think ours has a Twitter account. No, maybe I can run the Twitter account for them. But some sort of social media would be a great way to keep yourself informed, especially if you are older or have a chronic underlying illness

that may put you higher on the list, that you should be vaccinated before people who are younger or healthier. And so you need to know. So that is one way that you can keep yourself informed. Because they're not going to just call. That was a big question.

Are you going to get a text message from the governor to tell you that it's time to get your text in? No, you're not. Unfortunately, but that is one way you can do it. If you do have a government official who is doing regular press conferences, our governor does a press conference like every other day now. He was doing him every day for a while.

They're wild, by the way. If you are ever bored, tune in for one of Jim Justice's press conferences. Y'all, it's a wild, just a spinning wheel of a man who is just comedically out of his own depth. Yes. Who would like to talk about anything else other than COVID. who is just comedically out of his own depth, who would like to talk about anything else

other than COVID. And every once in a while, we'll be like, well, I've got a breakfast coming up a few months. He talks about, he'll talk about what old movies he was watching last night, and some pictures from that. And like, there was a picture of a trout with a Santa hat on in one of his slides and we

spent a lot of time on that. And then he referenced Ghostbusters 2. Anyway, watch a Jim Justice press conference. I mean, the fact that, I mean, he's just so ill equipped for the situation he finds himself in. If you weren't so genuinely bad person. Not West Virginia. If you weren't such a bad person, you'd feel bad for him.

But if you're, if you have someone in your state who was doing this, because sometimes they change the recommendations and like this whole idea of giving the vaccine out to 80 and above was not an idea until he said it in this press conference and then sent them out. And all of this happened in the middle of the fricking day. So you have to be watching these things closely, especially like in my case, my grandpa Dan was not going to be able to find out about this on his own. He was relying on his other family members who were a little more tech savvy, a little more plugged in to help him navigate this situation. And if you have people in your life who similarly maybe not able to find that information on their own, you know, help them out.

Before I'm sure you have a lot of other great information. I want to set the table in a way for something that like I feel like we didn't hit the nail on the head on it. And I've read a lot about this and I know that you have to. But in case you were unaware, I wanted to like sort of Sydney said something about how like the extent to which this is an unprecedented catastrophe, like the entire thing is unprecedented in our lifetimes. Yes.

There is no one who has experience with this, like in how to do it. And we are also speaking of unprecedented times, we have a federal government that is so It's so dysfunctional and handicapped by the terrible leadership that it has, that it is barely functional. And those two things are happening at the same time. You cannot must not like expect the government to, it is going to be the Wild West. Like it is going to be the Wild West because there was no funding given for this final mile of COVID vaccine distribution. There's not a plan.

And I think it's important to remember, you said like there's nobody who is gonna, who knows how to do this. We have experts who have the knowledge base, the experience, the understanding of the logistics and the science and all that, who can guide this. but there aren't that many. For something like this, there's only going to be a handful of people who have the experience and knowledge to be able to know how to respond to something unprecedented. And they're probably not evenly distributed throughout all of the state.

There's one of them leading every county health department. Exactly, which is why this needed to be a big federally led effort with very clear guidelines laid down for everybody to know how to follow. And that wasn't what happened. It was more of that, well, you'll know what's best for yourself and your neighbors and whatever, which is a nice thought. But like, I'm not an expert in this. And I guarantee like, there are a lot of people who are looking

to the CDC and the federal government to say, like, help us figure out how to do this. And the answer, well, you guys can do it for yourself. You can figure it out. That's not very helpful. Also, the person at the absolute top of the government is extremely preoccupied during a temperature room and cannot be bothered to provide any leadership. Well, I think the transition of government right now is another big problem because

it feels like the outgoing administration has kind of stopped. We should have just stuck with what we had. You don't change a horse midstream, you know? I'm not saying that, but I agree, Sydney. So what else can you do? I wouldn't say that. What else can you do? You can follow your local health department and government officials and keep yourself up to date. And this also, like I said, you can help

look out for vulnerable people around you who may not have access to this, whether because they don't understand the technology or because they don't, you know, think about people in your community. I help care for people in our community who are facing homelessness. And they don't think about people in your community. I help care for people in our community who are facing homelessness, and they don't necessarily have regular access to technology, social media, TV, whatever,

wherever we're getting this information, and I can help keep them informed if I'm informed. If you have a primary care physician, this is a good time to like make contact with them. They're probably not going to know right now what the plan is. So if they say that, that's normal. A lot of medical providers are not going to know exactly how this is going to come down. But they might. But to ask like, will we get a letter or a text or an email from the office or is it something we should be inquiring about on our own?

I imagine bigger health systems will probably sort of like we do with a lot of things. We'll send out a little reminder to you like, hey, we scanned all your charts. We can do that through the Electronomatical Record. And we see that you have these qualifying diagnoses or because you're at this age, you can come get your COVID vaccine now. And I don't think the office will have it. It'll probably be at the local pharmacy. I believe is the plan, but you do need to get an order for it from your physician. So these kinds of things might happen, or maybe it will be done as a drive through at your local health department.

That might be the way they decide to do it. It's going to be different state-to-state, county-to-county person-to to person. So having some contact with whoever takes care of you and would know that you qualify for the vaccine for whatever reason is a good idea. Checking with your state DHHR website, the Department of Health and Human Resource website, I check ours. This is not an exaggeration at least daily. Oh, it doesn't want that at least. Well, I said at least I always know because no matter where I am in the house, I can hear. I get in a, my phone actually alerts me if it's 10 a.m.

And I haven't checked. That's when our DHHR website updates the. Because in your your life, you haven't checked the DHHR website. I would recommend you check yours because your state's vaccine rollout plan should be there. I mean, you should have one and it should be accessible. I can watch the video of it or I can look at the slides myself. It's a version, ours is a version of what the CDC put forth, but with tweaking. That's probably what yours is too, but you can go check there.

Also, ask your employer if you were in a business where you're considered an essential worker or a frontline worker and you believe based on the guidelines that you should be vaccinated early before the general public. Check with your employer and find out, is there a list I need to be on or anything like that? Do we know?

It doesn't hurt because I don't know how these businesses are in each state getting it. And there are a lot of essential workers who need to be vaccinated. And I know we even got an email from a listener who talked about there, there was a standby list at their workplace. So if you were like, they were trying to start with the workers who were at highest risk. So again, age, other comorbidities, that kind of thing. But you could put your name on a standby list so that if they got to the end of a vial, and they didn't have anybody left to give the doses to, but they'd already opened it. So they had to use them.

They can go down the standby list and call people and say, Hey, if you can get here right now, I can give you the vaccine. I think that phone calls from people saying, if you can get here right now, I can get you the vaccine are going to happen a lot. More than you are comfortable with, dear listener. And so like making sure that you've checked with your employer and your name is on that list, if it exists,

I'm not saying it does everywhere, because this is different everywhere. But these are just some things you can do. Some avenues you can check to make sure that you're staying up to date. If you are somebody who should receive the vaccine, before it's going to be widely available. Because at some point, the plan is that anybody who wants it

can just go to the pharmacy and get it, just like you do a flu shot. That is the plan. And if you are someone who doesn't fall into any of these high risk categories, either based on your own health status, your age, or because of your exposure risk, because of your job, and you know, that kind of thing, you might just have to wait till them until it's widely available. But if you are a person in any of these categories, I

would at least be looking out and advocating for yourself. It was just true in all of healthcare, right? It's important to be your own advocate. It would be a great system if we just had everybody like age and all this ranked and we could just send out messages, text messages, emails, physical letters, whatever, and say, now it's your turn, come get your vaccine. That was not put in place ahead of time. You know, I think of other stuff you can do in the interim is trying to reduce vaccine hesitancy in your area amongst your friends and family, if you have older relatives like reaching out to them,

because one, three things, one, it's better for them to be vaccinated because you love them and you want them to be safe too. It's better for our society that more people are vaccinated. Three, your area will get more vaccines or won't get less vaccines. They won't decrease your alarm.

They won't decrease your alarm. And if these people are using the vaccine, so like if you have people in your life that are hesitant, reinforce with them that it's like safe and effective. And I think there's been a lot of pushes to like post pictures of yourself getting the vaccine. I actually think that's really helpful

because people can see that. And I think the more we normalize it, the more people that get it, I think the better off that we're going to be. I don't know the best place to like point people in terms of resources. I know immunized.org is the immunization action coalition. They've got tons of resources there. You can read up on. But I mean, the other the other thing is the CDC. Yeah. I mean, a lot of people ask me where I got a lot of information about the COVID vaccine.

Most of the stuff when it comes to the vaccine and the plan and all this stuff is easily discoverable at CDC.gov. They have plenty of resources that are made for everybody. They do have stuff targeted for like healthcare professionals, but they have plenty of resources that are made for everybody. They do have stuff targeted for healthcare professionals, but they have plenty of information on there that is easy to understand, easy to follow. It's not written in technical jargon. And answers like, exactly,

like they will walk you through what to expect when you go to get your vaccine. What happens before, during when you get your vaccine, they're gonna give you a little card that tells you when to come back and proves that you got your first vaccine and that kind of thing and what to expect after, what side effects are common, when to be concerned, all those kinds of things. It's all on there. And all the reasons, the most frequent concerns are all addressed there in really easy to understand language about why, as we talked about in the last episode,

the mRNA vaccines are not changing your DNA. That's just not how they work. That's not what they do, so you don't need to worry about that. I have worked. Another thing to do if you are somebody in the healthcare field, steal a lot of vaccines. No, don't. Don't, don't. But if you do, if you do earn the health care field and work at different dots, you can make yourself a little mobile vaccination card, a thousand dollars a pop in bang boom, no problem. No, please don't do that. But one, I have said before on the show, I work with Harmony House, which does outreach to our community facing homelessness. And there were a lot of questions among the staff who was able to get vaccinated about concerns

and things they weren't sure about. And so I wrote up a quick little document with some FAQs and some of my answers to them and like how to think about it. And that's something you can do in your community. You can be helpful. Like I literally said, please give my phone number and email address to everybody who works there and they can call me with their questions and I'll talk them through it. Right now, if you are someone within the healthcare field and you have sort of an understanding

of this terminology already, you speak this language, this is your chance to help your community. This is your chance to be a leader and to reach out and say, hey, if you have a question, just call me. And I mean, that's really, for a lot of people, it's all it takes. Most of the people who are hesitant about the COVID vaccine aren't like hardcore anti-vax, not gonna take any vaccine people.

They're just nervous because it seemed fast. And I understand, as we've talked about, I understand it seemed fast. And I understand, as we've talked about, I understand it seemed fast. It wasn't. For some of us, it seemed very slow. It was rapid. It wasn't quick. And I think that just talking through,

as we have on the show before, those kinds of things will ease a lot of fears and encourage a lot more people to go get the vaccines. And the sooner every vaccine is a win, that's the way I look at it. No matter who's getting these vaccines, every vaccine is a win because you can't achieve herd immunity without a vaccine, but you can with one or two or three. And hopefully more will get approved. I think we're going to be, maybe I think we're going to need millions.

I don't think one or two or three is going to do it. I think millions of people need to get vaccinated before we can achieve harder immunity. I would also, I know that the thing that happened in West Virginia made national news. I would be 36 and talk about it because it depresses me too, but. So one of the health departments,

one of the county level health departments in West Virginia received vaccine and some of the Regeneron monoclonal antibody treatment. And apparently got the two mixed up and administered 42 shots of the monoclonal antibody as opposed to 42 Moderna vaccines before they realized what had happened. The good news is those people should be absolutely fine. That should not be dangerous to them.

So that is the good news. Thank goodness that would be absolutely worst case scenario. It was harmful. But the bad news is on a personal level for them, once you've received monoclonal antibody treatments, you cannot receive a vaccine for 90 days. That's the recommendation so that it will be effective. So that puts unfortunately, those people further out from getting vaccines.

And then to, well, we wasted all those monoclonal antibodies. And they're expensive. Which are expensive in short supply. And then three, I think the other thing is, monoclonal antibodies. And they're expensive. Which are expensive and in short supply. And then three, I think the other thing is when stories like that make it to a national level and everybody becomes aware of them, it just, it makes more people hesitant. It makes more people, you know, afraid. And I would urge you, please, please know this,

that is such a wildly unlikely thing to happen. There are so many things put in place to ensure that that doesn't happen. I can't fathom that that, it's hard for me to believe it even happened once. This is my logic. It's actually better that it did happen because that makes it so less likely that it did happen because that makes

it so less likely that it'll happen again to you. Think about it that way. I like that kind of logic. But I just please, if people are talking about this, this is so, I mean, everybody I've talked to in the healthcare profession. So, and if you are, you know this. The idea that this could happen is so unlikely. There are so many safeguards in place. This is a one and a trillion freak accident. And I hate that it happened. It is obviously awful on many levels.

But like, this is not going to be the norm. This is not what's happening. So you can think of it as the norm. I wanted to say one other thing before we, this is like, too dire. but I wanted to get, tell me if I'm, this is what I feel. I know that it seems so freaking desperate and terrible like this idea that this is how this is working, like or not working more accurately. But I do believe this. I do believe that adults are coming, grown-ups are coming, beginning January 20th, and beyond. I feel like we are going to have more adults in the room that are going to make this work better. I think that they're going to be better about messaging.

I think it's going to be better about this distribution and logistics, and I think that we'll have a functional government in the nation again, which will be great. But I do think it will be better. But I think right now this is what you have to get a little active. Empower yourself in those around you to have the information and the knowledge that these vaccines are safe and effective and vitally important, not just for your own safety, but for the safety of everyone around you

who hasn't gotten it, can't get it. All the kids who are not eligible for vaccines yet, anybody who can't get these vaccines for any reason, it is vital that everybody who can and is offered a vaccine, please get it. And then I think again, to kind of advocate for yourself if you're someone who should be in one of the first tears of getting the vaccine, and you can check the CDC guidelines to see what they recommended as to who should get these these first. If you are somebody who is who fits those categories to know how to advocate for yourself, keep yourself aware and informed so you can get it as soon as it's there. And to look out for those around you who need it,

I mean, we did a good job in this state anyway of taking care of our vulnerable elderly population in nursing facilities, but we didn't really have a plan in place for everybody else. And so that's one thing that you can help do and advocate for people. Also keep in mind that on a human level, keep in mind, like as we've said already,

this is beyond unprecedented. I mean, it is a completely unique challenge. And with the exception of very few people, I think everyone is just like trying to do their best to figure it out. Like the people that you're going to interact with are almost certainly not responsible for this being as much of a mess as it is and will just be like doing their best. Like everybody, I feel like, is not everybody

because there are definitely some people at the higher upper echelons that are not making good choices, but like, I think that those effects are just trickling down to all these people on sort of the front lines of this that are being saddled with. There is like no plan and they're being forced to cobble one together, you know, build the plan as it's landing, how to deal. Yeah, I think, I think that's a good point to make.

When I say, you know, inquire and advocate for yourself. I do not mean, please call your local health department and choose somebody out if they don't have any. Because there's, please don't do that. A lot of people just don't know right now. You know, I know my parents own and run a small business that does like health information, technical support stuff, which puts their workers who go in and out of hospitals and healthcare facilities all day every day

at a higher tier to receive the vaccine. And one of the things they've been trying to figure out is what do we do as business owners for our employees? How do we get them on the list of essential workers? And as they've been calling around to try to figure that out, it's very clear that no one has that exact answer right now But when you call and ask Nicely you start to get that sort of sense at these organizations like we need to come up with a plan

We do need it. We don't have something in place and there's gonna be more businesses calling and you can be part of Helping things along not just yet just, yeah, please don't. I don't wanna unleash all of us as Karen's on people right now. That's not my goal. Caring, not Karen's. That's what I think. That's my new slogan for 2021. We all can be part of this together.

We can all work together to get the vaccine when it's offered to us and encourage others to do so, help people stay aware. Ease fears. This is going to have to be an effort that everybody is part of, including me. Maybe most importantly, me, you think most importantly, I didn't even thought about that way said that's thank you for saying that. I think that I do play a key role in this and I'm happy to be, you know, doing my, my duty. Thank you so much for listening to our program. We hope

you have enjoyed it. Thanks to the taxpayers for the use of their song medicines as the intro and outro of our program. If you have enjoyed it, you can find their music on a band camp. If you'd like to listen to more taxpayer stuff, why wouldn't you? If you have been offered the vaccine and you've taken it, thank you. Yes. Thank you for getting vaccinated. Every vaccine is a triumph right now. Why wouldn't you? If you have been offered the vaccine and you've taken it, thank you. Yes. For getting vaccinated, every vaccine is a triumph right now. That's just one step closer.

We all are, is the way I look at it. And make sure you remember you're not immune until six weeks after. Also, I wanted to say this is our first episode since the release of the Salmons Paperback edition, the Salmons book paperback went on sale on Tuesday. If you want to pick up a copy, that would be so cool of you. If you go to bit.ly-salmonspaperback, it is sold out some places, but you can still find

it in others. So please track a copy down. Hopefully you will buy that and enjoy it. We're very proud of it. bid.ly-forthslash-salbunds-paperback. Please check it out. And keep wearing your mask, keep washing your hands, keep distancing, all that stuff is still essential,

even if you've been vaccinated. Nothing changes yet. Yeah, nothing changes yet. Yeah, yet. That's gonna do it for us folks. So until next time, my name is Justin McElroy. I'm Sydney McElroy. And it's always don't drill a hole in your head.

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