Getting a Boost

booster shot

Yesterday my husband and I received the Pfizer Covid-19 booster shot. As soon as we heard it was recommended and approved for those age 65 and over, we scheduled our appointments at Walgreens. We arrived a few minutes early, filled out the paperwork, and quickly received our shots. The pharmacist did a great job, and I barely felt the injection.

So far we are doing well. Neither one of us has a fever, but our injection arms are pretty sore today. I was thinking of the irony of the fact that my left arm was finally pain-free following my frozen shoulder surgery a couple months ago, and now it hurts due to the shot! I will definitely take a couple days of arm pain to avoid getting Covid, that's for sure. 

All these break through cases (vaccinated people who are getting the Delta variant of Covid despite their vaccines) are pretty nerve-wracking. I know that vaccinated folks are pretty unlikely to end up in the hospital or die from Covid, but I don't want to get it in the first place. Who knows what the long-term repercussions will be from having the virus in your system?

As of yesterday in the United States, 213,752,856 people or 65% of the population have received at least one dose of the Covid vaccine. Overall, 185,265,610 people or 56% of the population have been fully vaccinated. We are still so far from the 70% vaccination rate goal.

In terms of the booster shot, over 2.8 million Americans had received the shot as of a couple days ago. Nearly 1 million have appointments scheduled to get their third dose. Keep in mind that as of right now, only the Pfizer vaccine has been approved for its booster. Those who received the Moderna series or the Johnson & Johnson single shot are still having to wait for government approval of boosters.

With so many people in the U.S. refusing to be vaccinated at all, despite the rising numbers of deaths in unvaccinated people, all we can do is take the steps to protect ourselves. Hopefully the third shot will help keep our defenses in place so that, in addition to good hygiene and mask wearing, we can remain virus-free.