In the past few months, “it’s not if– it’s when you get it,” has become the most common response to anyone stating they have not had COVID-19. Compared to, “we’re all in this together,” which we all heard in the Spring of 2020, attitudes are shifting as we close out the second year of the pandemic. This post-vaccine attitude toward the virus has been prevalent across the US, on and off Union’s campus, and is incredibly harmful for high-risk individuals. 

For many of us, getting the vaccine and booster allowed us to feel safer and wear our masks less around friends and family. While there was an increase in cases last month, vaccinated people have reported more mild symptoms. Pandemic fatigue has fully set in as we approach our third year living with COVID-19, CDC quarantine and isolation guidelines have relaxed, the New York mask mandate has been lifted, and many individuals are accepting that it is time to get sick, get better, and return to normal life. 

However, for many Americans, this mindset is not possible. Those with autoimmune diseases, cancer patients, transplant patients, and millions more are being left behind to continue living in the “new-normal.” For many of us, getting the vaccine was either an obvious next step or something we had the privilege to deny. The choice is more complex for those who are immunocompromised; they face a struggle between choosing what will best protect their own health and navigating the potential political interpretations of their personal health choices. 

After vaccination, many of us felt safe to start living normally again. Immunocompromised people do not have this luxury: if they are advised to get the vaccine by their doctor, many are still living like we did at the start of the pandemic. With a compromised immune system, they are left at a higher risk for serious illness and death from COVID-19. 

At the start of the pandemic, the disabled community spoke out about how it suddenly became possible to work from home, for delivery to replace shopping, and to make all the accommodations that were not possible when they did not affect the general population. This came as a bittersweet benefit to those with disabilities and chronic illnesses: while they finally received accommodations they needed, it came with the realization that the resources always existed for them, but were never employed until they were needed by healthy, able-bodied people. 

As everyone else complains of how long the pandemic has dragged on and takes steps towards returning to normal life, Americans at high risk for COVID-19 watch from the sidelines as the world moves on without them. The slogan that came with the start of the pandemic, “we’re all in this together,” gave us hope that we would make it through the pandemic together, and return to normal life together. In true American fashion, the “all” in that slogan turned out to be exclusionary.