Unfair and entitled – this is how many are describing people who skip the line and receive the vaccine before they are eligible.
Many know at least one person who has exaggerated their health or asked their boss to classify them as frontline workers to skip the line – experts call hypercompetitive behavior “vaccine hunger games”.
Karla Salazar, a childcare worker in San Francisco, describes the extent to which some people go to get the COVID-19 vaccine as “crazy”, including lying about being an essential worker.
“They say, ‘Ah, I work as a nurse’ and they get badges from friends,” she said.
On Monday, millions of Californians with serious health problems and disabilities became eligible for the vaccine.
San Francisco took it a step further, including homeless people, prisoners and others in high-risk congregated environments.
But as the vaccine opens up to more people, so does the opportunity for more line changes and vaccine cheating.
“It’s a competition and it shouldn’t be,” said UCSF epidemiologist Dr. George Rutherford. “I think people need to keep in mind the broader goals of society, which is to interrupt transmission.”
He says that getting an appointment from someone who lives in a high-transmission area makes the pandemic more difficult to fight.
“We don’t want vaccine starvation games,” said Rutherford. “There is a logic to that, and please wait your turn.”
Some agree.
“This is not fair,” said Soon Tani Beccaria Mochizuki from San Francisco. “People who really need the vaccine deserve it first.”
While others say that vaccinating anyone will help us achieve collective immunity.
“You know what? The more people get vaccinated, that’s the most important thing,” said Shawn Gupta, from San Francisco. “Better for all of us, so let’s do this.”
The city of San Francisco requires everyone to check a box and sign their names, swearing that they are eligible to receive the vaccine, but some say that simply relying on people’s honesty makes it very easy to trick the system.
Below is more information from the San Francisco COVID Command Center
We advise all San Francisco vaccination providers with the guidelines below on checking eligibility:
- Use reasonable procedures to verify that people who present for vaccination meet the eligibility criteria, avoiding excessively expensive documentation requirements that create barriers to vaccination.
- Workers in different work sectors differ in the available documentation that can check their work status. Providers may adopt methods that include, but are not limited to, checking job identification badges, payment receipts or letters from employers, recognizing that, in some circumstances, it may be more feasible, as well as fairer, to trust rather than trust. obtain the certificate signed by the workforce sector vaccine.
- Ultimately, it is up to the vaccinating entity to decide on the appropriate process to verify eligibility; however, vaccination sites serving populations and communities disproportionately affected by COVID19 must ensure that access to vaccines is low-barrier.
- This communication will be updated if additional guidance on the eligibility check is published by CDPH.