Happy with AstraZeneca

I have a simple point to make – that vaccination is freedom. Freedom mentally, financially and existentially. The alternative is constant lockdown, and I think we are all beginning to agree that is not much of an alternative.

My mother was three years old when her sister Ellen got the measles. Unlike now, there was no choice to vaccinate or not to vaccinate. Measles is a viral disease, contracted through air droplets. Sound familiar? Ellen died, and my grandmother’s heart was broken. That was 1940.

Fast forward to now, and I got vaccinated as soon as I could, and I was lucky enough to be in the first wave (1b) because I am a volunteer firefighter.

I visited the lovely nurses at Parkes Street in March to receive my first AstraZeneca shot. I was surrounded by a busload of cackling seniors, all
80 plus, who had come down from Wollongong to make a day out of it and to avoid the long lines at their local clinics. They were all gorgeous, just like the nurses.

After the jab, which I hardly noticed, I waited dutifully for fifteen minutes in the area set aside to watch for side effects. One by one, all the seniors marched right out.

“Aren’t you going to wait fifteen minutes?” I asked them.

They chuckled. “Time for coffee!” they replied.

To hell with any side effects. They had Helensburgh to explore and life to live.

I was half expecting to see them all again when I returned in early June. But the vaccination rate had slowed to a crawl and the clinic in Parkes St was empty. I didn’t have to wait.

The nurse asked me how I went after my first jab. I told her I had gone down to the flooded Hawkesbury River region the day after, dragging debris into stinking piles. I was hot and sweaty, but I didn’t know whether it was hard work or fever that caused it. The nurse said that was probably a good thing, as I couldn’t dwell on it. I had never thought of myself as a “dweller”, but had a long think about it.

In comparison, my husband was nauseous and miserable for two days after his first AstraZeneca jab. We had a face-off about what that said about him versus me. Of course it meant I had a superior constitution. According to him the vaccination hadn’t worked properly with me. I wasted a good hour investigating this claim. It turned out to be untrue, but by then he had been grinning the whole morning.

A lot of people have had AstraZeneca. More than six million doses of that vaccine have been administered in Australia. On the Australian government’s health website ( health.gov.au) you can find out more: “AstraZeneca can be used in adults aged under 60 years where the benefits clearly outweigh the risk for that individual and the person has made an informed decision based on an understanding of the risks and benefits.”

A talk to your GP can also help you overcome any fears you might have about vaccines and he or she can work with you on a clear plan to manage your worries afterwards. Friends and family can help too.

Even if there still are no vaccines available to you, it might help to stay well-informed and proactive, so you are ready to seize a vaccination opportunity when it opens up.

For more facts about vaccination: www.health.gov.au; ncirs.org.au; covid-vaccine.healthdirect.gov.au

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Iris Huizinga migrated to Australia from The Netherlands, where she was a screenwriter. She graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne. Since 2009 she has been involved in the local area as a volunteer at the surf club and later with the local fire brigade. After a stint in New Zealand she returned with her family to the 2508 area in January 2020, because she missed the raucous cockatoos, the big eucalyptus trees and the ocean.