With the COVID-19 vaccine now available for people who are at least 12 years old, many students and teachers at MHS are fully vaccinated or at least partially vaccinated. People who are over the age of 12 can get the Pfizer vaccine, while people who are at least 18 years old can get either the Moderna or the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Here are some recountings of the experiences and opinions about the COVID-19 vaccine from people in MHS who have been vaccinated.
Kristina Tao, a Chinese teacher at MHS, got the Pfizer vaccine at Levi’s Stadium. There were a lot of spots open at Levi’s, so she didn’t have any trouble getting an appointment, Tao said in a Zoom interview. She had some flu-like side effects after she got the first dose, and her side effects after the second dose were slightly worse than the first dose side effects, but she felt fine after a couple of days, Tao stated.
When asked if she thinks that the vaccine is safe to get, Tao said, “No, I don’t have concerns. [We have] to be responsible, especially teachers [because] you see different people every day, [and] I meet my students every day. If I don’t get [the vaccine], there’s a chance [that] if I get the disease, it won’t kill me, but I [might spread the virus to others]. However, I do have some concerns about the vaccine. [The time it took to produce the vaccine was] shorter than all the other vaccines we got.”
Senior Ashley Huerta is also fully vaccinated, and she got the Pfizer vaccine at Rite Aid, Huerta said in a Zoom interview. Huerta’s health provider did not have the vaccine available, so her health provider recommended that she get the vaccine at a local pharmacy, she stated. She chose to get her vaccine at Rite Aid because it told her what vaccine she was getting before her appointment, as opposed to other places that did not tell her what vaccine she would get, Huerta said. The only side effect that Huerta had was a sore arm for both doses, so her vaccine experience was not that bad, Huerta added.
When asked about her opinion on the previously recalled Johnson and Johnson vaccine due to a few Johnson and Johnson vaccine recipients getting blood clots, Huerta said, “I think getting a vaccine is the priority, and it’s why medical professionals are [pausing] the [use] of [the Johnson and Johnson vaccine] because they believe that it’s better to get a vaccine than no vaccine. There’s an extremely small chance of getting the blood clots, so if you have the chance to get a Johnson & Johnson vaccine, it’s better to just get it.”
Another student who got the vaccine is senior Jessica Liu. She got the Moderna vaccine at a Rite Aid for her first dose, and later went to a CVS for her second dose, Liu said in a text message interview. The reason why Liu got the vaccine at two different locations is that the Rite Aid that she went to was two hours away from her house, and she wanted to go somewhere closer, Liu said. It was difficult to book a vaccine appointment that was within an hour of her house, Liu added. She experienced some pain in her arm after the first dose and she had a headache and a sore arm after her second dose, Liu stated.
Liu also talked about her opinion on the safety of the vaccines. “I am a little skeptical of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, but getting a vaccine is better than not getting one,” Liu said. “Pfizer and Moderna are basically the same to me [in terms of its effectiveness and side effect severity], but I have family members who experienced a lot of symptoms from getting Moderna, which scared me a bit. Overall, I think the vaccines are safe since there have been many trials done that show they are effective. It is very important for everyone to get vaccinated so we can flatten the curve even more and return to a normal life.”
Liu feels a lot safer after being vaccinated, but she still worries about going to crowded spaces and meeting people, Liu said. She thinks it will take her a while to become used to being around a large group of people or touching things outside even after this pandemic is over, Liu said. Due to the pandemic, Liu has been cleaning and disinfecting things more often, which is a good thing that happened as a result of COVID-19, Liu added.
The CDC recently announced fully vaccinated people do not have to wear their masks in most public places and Liu shared her thoughts on this new update. “I think the CDC is being a little too relaxed, and this policy will allow many people to take off their masks in, for example, grocery stores,” Liu said. “We don’t know who is and isn’t vaccinated, which is a big risk for everyone. I think we should wait at least another year before the mask policy is lifted.”
