Imagine your home is pitch black when you walk through the front door. You turn on the hall light, then a room lamp, and, moving from room to room, you provide the illumination necessary to live comfortably and safely.
Locally, vaccination rates by community range from 64 percent of Lynn residents who have received a first vaccination dose to 66 percent in Salem; 68 percent in Peabody; 71 percent in Revere and Saugus; 82 percent in Lynnfield and Swampscott; 83 percent in Marblehead and 84 percent of Nahant residents have received a first dose.
The numbers boil down to one undeniable truth: A sufficient number of people have received the COVID-19 vaccine to tell their loved ones, neighbors, friends and coworkers that it is safe and that it is the path away from the pandemic.
We rely on the government and scientists to update us on the official vaccination approval process and to explain why and when we may need COVID-19 booster shots.
But those of us who are vaccinated are the foot soldiers in the war on COVID-19. We can explain to the unvaccinated how we felt after we got the shot. Vaccination, we can explain to skeptics, has not turned us into mindless robots or exposed us to any of the risks anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists scream about on social media.
There are numerous opportunities to get the vaccine, even if you are homebound due to medical or other reasons. Dialing 2-1-1 guides callers through vaccination scheduling.
Explaining the process in detail to anyone who hasn’t had the shot can help us erase rate disparities among communities and age groups.
For instance, 90 percent of Lynn residents age 50 and older have been vaccinated while just over half of the city’s 12-15 year-olds have been vaccinated with the start of school weeks away.
Vaccination rates among teens are lower in Salem and slightly higher in Revere. Almost 15,000 of Marblehead’s 19,000 residents are fully vaccinated while 35,000 of Peabody’s 55,000 residents are fully vaccinated.
Unless you are completely self-sufficient and live alone, vaccination is not a personal choice — it is a collective responsibility. Each of us is not safe unless we get vaccinated to help make everyone around us safe.
When this thinking is echoed from individual to individual, then we are on our way to vanquishing COVID-19.
Local communities are making strides with vaccination even as other parts of the country fail to boost vaccination rates and other countries struggle to get vaccines stocked and distributed.
Vaccines are available, they are free and they have ensured thousands of people are safe from COVID-19. Now is the time to make sure you are one of these people.
Get vaccinated and be the light to drive COVID-19’s darkness out of all of our lives.
