Hello, and happy Friday! Well, maybe not for AstraZeneca. The vaccine maker faced a PR nightmare after more than a dozen European countries suspended use of its vaccine following reports of very rare, but nonetheless serious, blood clots after vaccination. The European Medicines Agency, the EU’s drug regulator, conducted an investigation into the matter, concluding yesterday that the jab is “safe and effective.”
But that’s unlikely to be the last word on AstraZeneca. The vaccine has had a pretty bad rap in Europe since its rollout began, owing in part to supply issues and erroneous claims that it is “quasi-ineffective” for people over 65. As a result, Europeans tend to view the jab less favorably than other vaccines, such as Pfizer and Moderna. This is particularly true in vaccine-hesitant France, where a recent poll found that more than half of the French public no longer trusts AstraZeneca, up from just 22 percent earlier this month. More on France’s vaccine skepticism below
I can’t help but wonder how all of this must look to countries that have scarcely begun vaccination: While wealthy European countries spar over access to doses they aren’t distributing, the United States continues to sit on millions of doses that it hasn’t even authorized for use. To the U.S.’s credit, though, it was recently reported that the country will share some of its stockpile with its neighbors in Canada and Mexico. Perhaps “America First” hasn’t prevailed after all.
In podcast news: I joined The Bunker this week to discuss the murder of Sarah Everard and the London Metropolitan Police’s poor handling of last weekend’s vigil in her honor. You can tune in via your favorite podcast app or by clicking here.
Also: I’m joining The Bunker’s first live Zoom on Thursday, March 25th at 8pm GMT! The show is exclusive to The Bunker’s Patreon backers—you can find more details on how to become one here.
What I’ve written
If certain corners of the French internet are anything to go by, COVID-19 vaccines are unsafe, those who refuse them risk becoming “second-class citizens,” and the country has turned into a “health dictatorship.” That such claims have gained currency in France—home to Louis Pasteur, a robust welfare state, and a universal-health-care system—would have been far-fetched 25 years ago. But the country that helped develop the rabies and anthrax vaccines is now one of the most vaccine-hesitant nations on the planet—so much so, in fact, that a recent poll found that as little as 40 percent of its population intends to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.
To understand how France came to be this way and what its government is doing about it, I spoke with public-health experts, disinformation researchers, and those advising the French government on its vaccination communication strategy. When I asked whether the country’s efforts to convince its vaccine-hesitant population to take the jab would be enough, none was optimistic.
“We won’t get to herd immunity with vaccination,” one researcher told me. “There’s only one alternative—and if it’s not with a vaccine, it’s by infection.” Keep reading here
What I’ve read
This tremendous essay on becoming a parent during the pandemic:
My babies are almost eight months old and I can count on one hand the number of people we’ve spent time with since they were born. Other than my husband, not a single person I love has really seen me being a mother. This new person I’ve become since I gave birth is a person virtually no one knows.
This fascinating long-read on the identity hoaxers who claim racial identities that are not their own:
The superficial similarities among all of these cases are striking: mostly women, all educated and professionally successful, all working in fields engaged with questions of oppression and marginalization. And in all of these cases, somewhere along the line, empathy tipped into appropriation. It was not enough to feel the pain of marginalized groups; they had to be part of them, too.
This relatable (and reassuring) essay on our pandemic-addled brains:
This is the fog of late pandemic, and it is brutal. In the spring, we joked about the Before Times, but they were still within reach, easily accessible in our shorter-term memories. In the summer and fall, with restrictions loosening and temperatures rising, we were able to replicate some of what life used to be like, at least in an adulterated form: outdoor drinks, a day at the beach. But now, in the cold, dark, featureless middle of our pandemic winter, we can neither remember what life was like before nor imagine what it’ll be like after.
What I’m thinking about
The accuracy of this chart (I’ve never baked my way through writer’s block, but perhaps it’s time to try):
Until next time,
Yasmeen
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