It’s been a busy few weeks since I mentioned my wanting to address the figurative elephant in the room…..the exam room…..the emergency room. But seeing as I have some extra time to give my thoughts on the subject matter affecting so many right now and it’s in a field that I’m rather knowledgeable of, I guess there’s no time like the present. Please excuse any typos or grammatical errors that follow. It’s a lot to write about and consider.

I’m not sure of the best approach to make this easy, but I have found that I do better by most patients and students by being direct with my medical advice. So let’s go with that and do it in a Q&A format with simplified answers.

1 – Should you get the vaccine for COVID? Yes, you should get the vaccine for COVID. There are several reasons why and I’ll hit many of them in a moment. But the overwhelming answer is yes to this question. If you are fortunate enough to have a knowledgeable medical professional who you have experience with then ask them their thoughts on this question and see what they say. I’m pretty sure most will say yes as well.

2 – Why should you get the vaccine for COVID? Where do I start on this one. Let’s see….you don’t want to die seems like the top choice that I keep coming up with. This may be alarming to go from 0 to 100 but again, being direct is what I do best. Yes, death is highly likely without the vaccine. Think about that and let it sink in deeply. I am not being dramatic when I say this. I literally have patients, family members, and colleagues that have lost their lives as a result of this highly contagious and deadly virus. Many of those people, their families, and their friends would likely have chosen a vaccine over those people being dead and gone. If you want to know for sure then just ask around how those people who have lost someone to COVID feel about whether they would take the vaccine. There are plenty that are around you everyday.

So the high likelihood of you dying isn’t enough? Well how about you don’t want the people who are near and dear to you dying? Again, not being dramatic. I’m being honest and direct. Many people who become positive for COVID fail to realize that their lack of symptoms doesn’t stop them from passing the virus to others who are vulnerable. Those people then get the virus from you and then they suffer a range of symptoms that could have been prevented. If they are lucky the symptoms will be mild. Yet, most people these days are getting sicker and sicker, then headed back to the place where this began in March of 2020, and that’s the hospital. Once they are there it’s truly sad to say that many don’t ever make it out. So that close loved one that you adore is now sick and dying as a result of something that could have easily prevented things from getting to that point. That’s something that could prevent this is a vaccination.

So you dying isn’t enough? And your close loved one’s getting sick and dying also isn’t convincing enough? Well let’s go one step further. Let’s say you (or your loved one) is one of the lucky people to not get so sick that death happens. Great, congratulations. But wait. That doesn’t mean that the sickness of COVID will be quick and easy. Not by far. A lot of my patients and people in general fail to realize that once they are COVID positive that the symptoms don’t just come and go. Nope! Actually, when you become positive the symptoms often begin very slowly and progress until you feel extremely ill. That illness is now lingering and causes you to feel sick for weeks in most instances. For many it’s months and even years of feeling far less than 100%.

Besides that, many think that they will just stay home and be ill during the time they feel sick, not realizing that when you are too ill to stay home you have to go get care from a healthcare facility of some sort. Most people think they will go to their doctor’s office, urgent care, or the emergency room. Good idea right? Sure it’s a great idea to get care when you feel ill. But you don’t realize until you can’t breath, are severely fatigued, or have a fever that’s sky high that there are thousands of people who think just like you! That’s right, so all of you are calling the doctor’s office, going to the urgent care, and traveling to the emergency rooms at the same time. This causes healthcare facilities across the world to be overloaded, medical supplies to be depleted, and the doctors, nurses, and health personnel to be exhausted. Now you (or that loved one) have to suffer a lot longer than usual or not receive care at all.

Allow me to put it in another form for people who still don’t get it. Imagine you’re trying to swim, but no matter what you do you can’t seem to keep your head above water. You do everything you can to get out of the water but it’s just not working. You are literally drowning and need help. And when you need help you think “someone throw me a life raft”. Yet, you can’t get the one because the supply of life rafts is diminished. You then think “the lifeguard will save me” because “I’m obviously not doing well”. Yet, the lifeguard can’t come save you because they are occupied trying to save all the other folks that started drowning before you did. You finally think, “there has to be boats that I can depend on to rescue me”. Yet, those boats are stretched so thin with people drowning that the best they can do is tell you to wait and hold on as long as you can and we will get to you when we can. Or even worse they say our boat is full and you have to swim somewhere else to get help. This is what’s happening right now. Day after day. Week after week.

There are plenty of other reasons that I can share, but I’ll give you one more that people overlook or just don’t consider when it comes to this virus. Let me start with a question. Do you like money? Most people do. I’m not saying it for the reason most people think, which is the idea that you can get an “incentive” to go and get vaccinated. Again, I say loudly….Nope! I ask do you like money because when you are sick with COVID, most of the money you earn goes away because you’re too sick to work. Let that sit with you for a minute. You are the income earner in your family, whether you are by yourself, have a significant other, or have a large family. Now you are sick and can’t work so the income you normally get is gone. What’s even more of an issue is that you now have to spend a lot of money to get better! So you are losing money in two ways. Money going out on healthcare costs and no money coming in because you can’t work. Well what if you begin to feel fine? You can just go back to work and start your job again? Hopefully this is the answer here. But don’t forget that you still may have to quarantine for an extended period of time and that means more income lost. I have seen this happen with many patients and it’s shocking to them that this happens. It shouldn’t be but it is.

All of this because you thought that it won’t be you or your loved one who gets affected. Or that if you did get ill it would be so easy to deal with and recover. Or you didn’t think about the financial burden that comes along with the physical burden. All of this is not worth it. Trust me, I’m a doctor. This means I see it nearly every day and I say the same thing over and over. Get the vaccine and get it yesterday!

3 – Who should you listen to or consult with to find out if the vaccine is appropriate for you? I have to take a deep breath and shake my head back and forth that I even have to answer this but alas, I do. Let me put it as plain as possible. I have said it earlier but I’ll say it again. It should be a trained medical professional that you trust or someone who is truly knowledgeable about the vaccine and your health status. Allow me to explain why I say it like this. I have many patients who come to my office and say things like “I heard that someone had this reaction”. Or, “my family member told me about this side effect”. Or, “I saw on TV that this happened to this person”. And the list of reasons for concern go on and on. I get it. Most concerns are valid. But when I respond with the question “Where did they do their medical training or get their medical degree?”, I often hear silence or laughter.

It’s sad to me that many people will listen to any and everyone who has no medical training whatsoever for medical advice or advice on a life saving vaccine. Yet those people who are doing the listening often fail to do simple things. 1) They don’t do their own research. 2) They don’t share their entire medical history with the person who is giving that advice. 3) They don’t consider making an appointment and engaging with a medical professional to discuss their concerns, hesitation, or questions. Nope! Instead they think that listening to the person who’s not medically trained makes sense. Which is the exact opposite of what it truly is. I would like to think that they won’t call someone who isn’t educated or trained in the legal system for legal advice. Yet many take this route for their medical care. It’s a bad idea so don’t do it. Otherwise, you can just call your family member, watch TV, or go by word of mouth when you need legal advice and not a legal professional.

4 – Last question of this long post…..should I wait to get the vaccine because it’s so new and I don’t know what the side effects or long term effects will be? This is tough and a very valid concern/question. I get it. I truly do. You want to be sure you are getting a vaccine that is safe and are not wanting to subject yourself to something that is risky and could cause long term damage. All are valid concerns. But here’s how I see it. You need to understand that the side effects and long term effects won’t matter if you get sick from the COVID virus and aren’t around to find out! Think about it. You are so concerned that the vaccine will cause damage and while you are in the “waiting period” you actually get COVID and then get hospitalized or die because you skipped getting a vaccine that could have been life saving. I think of this like a person who can’t swim saying that they won’t use the new life vest because they aren’t that familiar with it. They continue thinking this even though all the Olympic swimmers and coaches and others who are veterans to swimming endorse the life vest. So they go without it and as a result, they sink. This happens in plain sight of others including those highly trained swimmers, coaches, and veterans to swimming. And it could have been prevented by trusting those that know best and have all the experience.

Yes, there are risks to the vaccine and there are side effects. But what I tell my patients about this is that you have to consider the risks of both and what is more likely. You may have side effects from the vaccine. You may have a bad reaction. Yet, this is very unlikely based on all the research that has taken place. And before you say the vaccine has only been out for a short period of time, I tell people to come to me with their facts of where that information comes from. Meaning, don’t just say that statement without having done your research. If you do the research on your own, you will see that much of the technology and research that led up to the vaccine has been around for years, perhaps even a decade or more. What is more likely is that you will contract COVID unknowingly, get sick, deteriorate, and pass away. That’s not my wish or me trying to scare anyone. It’s me looking at what’s in front of my face daily. People ignoring the science, listening to the wrong sources for their information, getting this highly contagious and deadly virus, and then calling me and saying they wish they would have got the vaccine. They say that because the illness is often so bad and so debilitating that they truly underestimated how bad it is. It’s similar to the flu vaccine and when people get the severe cases of the flu. It’s not until this happens that people seem to learn. How about you try to learn another way instead of learning by trial and error. I mean your life and your loved one’s lives do depend on it.

A lot of things have risks in the medical field. This includes many things like basic medications like ibuprofen or aspirin, or blood pressure medications, or surgeries, or injections. And I would be willing to bet most people that you have little to no idea what goes on or what all is contained in many of those medically related things. But you have tried them and taken that risk because the risks that are there if you don’t do it are devastating and deadly. How do you figure out which risk is acceptable for you and which is not? You consult with a trusted medical professional and allow them to give you information and guidance on what may be best for you. Not the TV. Not word of mouth. Not the random family member that knows it all. The trusted medical professional should be able to help you determine what risk is or is not acceptable, what is more likely to happen if you do or don’t do something, and back it up with facts, data, or medical literature. If not, then get a better medical professional. There are plenty who are out there.

Yes there is more and maybe I’ll cover it in a later post. But hear me when I say, I am truly tired. Not from writing this. But from having to see so many people suffer when they don’t have to. And from having to keep repeating myself over and over and over. It’s a common thing that folks have to learn things the hard way in order to truly learn. Don’t be that person. Hear me when I say that your doctors, nurses, therapists, and others in the healthcare field are also tired. Help us if you can. Get the vaccine. And if by chance others ask you what made you get it, tell them there was a doctor who cared enough about my life that he took a long time writing about why I should and I took it from there.

Dr. Jasper