– How did you qualify? someone boldly asked in the comments, unleashing what would become the first of a series of troubled touchpoints in which sharing my vaccine status opened me up to possible examination and judgment.
Whose business was it if I had a comorbidity or special circumstances that qualified me to get the vaccine? What responsibility did I have to let others know that I didn’t cross the line without sharing personal details?
The more people I talked to, the more I realized that sharing my vaccine status was a more thorny issue than I had imagined. What else had escaped me in my haste to share my status? Maybe I shouldn’t have shared so quickly.
Social pressures are real
Sharing vaccine status with friends and family and on social media can mean a flood of support – and it can also mean unwanted control, questions, or even side effects. That’s what I experienced.
“We debated whether to post vaccine selfies because our comorbidities allowed us to get it sooner than some friends who are also eager to get it. Since not everyone was able to get it from once, I felt simultaneous relief and guilt, because I knew so many others were waiting, ”said Courtney Finnerty, a parent living in Rochester, New York.
Finnerty ended up sharing the vaccine status to help normalize the process for others.
Work and decision to disclose
While the Americans with Disabilities Act protects employees from their employers to share their vaccine status with others, “your employer may be entitled to information about your vaccine status,” said Margaret Riley, a professor at the University of Virginia teaching food and drug law, health law, bioethics and public health law. This is especially true if being unvaccinated is a special threat to others – examples include restaurant workers, teachers who personally train students and health workers in medical institutions.
Some worry that their employers may force them to return to the office before they feel safe to return if they share their vaccine status.
“I admit I’m pretty upset that it means my job will get me back to my office sooner,” said a friend who works at the New York City publishing house and was afraid to be named because of the employer’s potential reaction. , which did not particularly support employees during the pandemic.
Others worry that sharing their vaccine status may be politicized and cost them business.
“It’s difficult. Speaking from a monetary and business owner perspective, vaccination means I don’t have to pass on the cost of my ongoing Covid-19 tests to my clients,” said Heather Gold Casto, a chef and event provider working in the Valley. Hudson of New York, who was recently vaccinated and is required to undergo regular Covid-19 tests.
“But it could also prevent potential customers from booking me based on a difference of opinion about the vaccine,” she said. “It’s in a way consistent with the fact that you’re not talking about politics. I’d like to reserve my clients based on my abilities, not my beliefs. Specifically, I don’t want to be passed over because of my beliefs.”
“Jobs and businesses are likely to treat people who haven’t been vaccinated and people who refuse to disclose if they’ve been vaccinated in the same way – telling them they can’t engage in certain activities,” said Kayte Spector-Bagdady. lawyer and bioethicist working as an associate director at the Center for Bioethics and Social Sciences in Medicine and as an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Michigan School of Medicine. These could include things like dining in restaurants or attending movies or theater shows or other indoor cultural events.
What happens if you are asked to reveal your status?
“Do you have to share vaccine status with anyone? It all depends on the context of the situation,” Riley said.
Some employers may ask for your status to protect other employees or patients, students or clients who want or need to visit them.
If you refuse to disclose your status?
“Theoretically, you can always refuse to reveal that you have been vaccinated, but it could have a high cost, such as not being able to go to the doctor’s office, work in person or travel,” said Spector-Bagdady.
“Because there are no official passports for the vaccine, there is no real way to be sure someone is telling the truth,” Riley said.
I’ve been here before
The recent refrains of “sharing your status” evoke a similar wording around another virus that has existed for several decades and has a great stigma attached to it – HIV / AIDS.
“I think the reason there’s a backlash against the division of vaccine status is similar to that of PrEP and U = U in the last 10 years,” said Damon Jacobs, a marriage and family therapist in New York who worked with LGBTQ. and the HIV-AIDS community.
Jacobs said that a positive way to consider whether or not to share is to bend down in time and consider sharing your status as a way to open up and create a more inclusive and loving environment, which helps others feel safe doing the same. .
The decision is personal
Until the general adult population catches up, many who have had an advance before may find themselves in this vaccine purgatory, where specific eligibility has allowed some to have access to vaccines for reasons that are not always clear to the public. This means that two people in the same age group or location may not have qualified at the same time. This can leave those who have been vaccinated before the vast majority feel a paradox of relief and gratitude, but also guilt and worry.
“Whether you were vaccinated or not, it’s your own private medical information,” Spector-Bagdady said. “Places like hospitals or your doctor in general cannot share this information without your written permission. But there are likely to be growing circumstances in which you may want to share your vaccine status. A small gathering of friends, for example, might want to share the status of the vaccine with them. soothes any anxieties that people may have. ”
Reality analysis
The truth is that Covid-19 does not magically disappear when you get vaccinated and therefore we should not treat this stage as all that is final, both in terms of how we assume others might be eligible to access the vaccine as well as in the way they decide to share the news.
“The vaccine was promoted as our ticket back to a ‘normal’ society. However, many people are eager to return to a ‘normal’ society, probably because this idea is simply not possible,” he said. Alexandra Lo Re, Social Worker Clinic based in Oyster Bay, New York. “We will never return to a world where Covid-19 does not exist.”
Sharing your vaccine status is heavier than you might have thought, but the truth is, we all find out on the go. There is no playing card, there is no Holy Grail. There is no right or wrong answer when it comes to how or not to share your vaccine status.
You know your circumstances better than anyone else and you are better suited to decide what you feel comfortable sharing with whom and when. Rest assured that you are not alone in navigating this new terrain full of questions and uncertainty.
In addition, if you have received the vaccine, you have already made the most important decision.
Allison Hope is a writer and native New Yorker who promotes humor instead of sadness, television travel, and coffee instead of sleep.