Immunization update the first

Yesterday I was finally able to get my first COVID-19 vaccination shot! And yes, that probably sounds strange to my fellow Americans who've been able to get one for months now, but it's been a lot slower here in Australia. The government last year went big on AstraZeneca (which could be produced locally) with a smaller amount of Pfizer, only to run into a problem of not having nearly enough supply to vaccinate everyone in a reasonable time frame. (Two months ago, when something like 60% of Americans had received at least one dose, the rate for Australia was around 12%.)

To make matters worse, the AstraZeneca vaccine was discovered to have some extremely rare but serious blood-clotting side-effects, to the tune of 1–2 deaths per million recipients. There's always a risk with any vaccine, of course, but the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation declined to recommend it for people under some age limit, I think 50 or 60. So despite there actually being a decent (if still insufficient) supply of AstraZeneca shots, the perception developed that it was inferior to Pfizer, leading to a lot of people (even those above the age limit) putting off being vaccinated until they could get a Pfizer shot. And the much more limited Pfizer supply was initially going to more high-priority people like health workers (partly since it only had a 3-week cadence for both shots instead of AstraZeneca's 6 weeks so people could get fully immunized faster).

I wasn't eligible for a shot at all until the premier of Victoria announced AstraZeneca as being available to under-40s a few weeks ago (only took 6 lockdowns!). Though interestingly I seem to have unintentionally gamed the system: last week I signed up for an appointment for an AstraZeneca shot under the logic that even a single shot before I flew out was better than nothing, with an intention of getting a second shot in the US. This past Monday however it was announced that due to a recent delivery Pfizer was now available to under-40s, though not wanting to be one of the (literal) myriads of people canceling appointments for AstraZeneca in favor of Pfizer I didn't pay it much attention.

When I got to my appointment yesterday, various people kept asking me to my great confusion whether I wanted a Pfizer shot instead of AstraZeneca (at least six or seven times!). I didn't know that the day before it had also been announced that people who'd signed up for AstraZeneca would be offered Pfizer (at least for a short period of time, I'm not sure of the exact details). Anyway, I wasn't aware at the time that Pfizer had a 3-week waiting period, since it's been being delivered at a 6-week cadence (like AstraZeneca) here in Australia to help relieve supply shortages.

I thus figured I'd just get the shot I came for, until I mentioned in response to the nurse's small talk that I was finishing up my PhD and flying back to the US in a few weeks. She immediately mentioned that Pfizer only actually had a 3-week wait instead of 6-weeks like AstraZeneca, and that they could set me up for a second appointment in 3 weeks (which is two days before I fly out!). When I realized I could be fully vaccinated instead of just half, I finally changed my mind and accepted the offer.

So that's how I ended up unintentionally gaming the vaccination system and will be fully vaccinated before flying back to the US next month. I'm still a bit amazed how it worked out, but it's certainly a huge relief. I'm still a bit tired like last night (which I spent feeling like I was either coming down with or recovering from a mild-but-weird cold), so I should end this here and get to bed. A hui hou!