COVID Vaccine Reflections

The thing that stands out for me as the one stark difference between 2020 and 2021 is the COVID vaccine. I know, technically it was approved last year, but the very first day that you could get the Pfizer vaccine if you were not in a vaccine trial was December 14th, and seventeen days later, the very eariler that re-vaccination would be recommended would put you squarely into 2021. For oh so many reasons it is time for a do over, a restart in order to get off the treadmill of sameness that we have been on for almost a year and to think about what we might and might not be able to do going forward. The answer is that we don't quite know. At least to start off, it will change very little. We still wear masks in public places and masks and face shields are still haute coutour at the hospital. We still keep apart from each other, and we are not certain that vaccination keeps you from becoming a carrier of sorts. The other key point is that because we have done such a crap job of staying apart from each other, the virus has changed, mutating to a more contagious version of its former self and it just isn't clear what the response will need to be to that. The good new is that at least for right now, the time being, it seems like a big step in the right direction. It is just a shame that the whole thing became about the politics of re-election and 1/2 a million people had to die because the wrong man made the wrong choices and people chose to believe someone with a vacabulary that does not top 500 words over science and a man who has over 500 months of infectious disease experience. We cannot change what happened in the past, but let's work to make a brighter future.