Cancer patients have been forgotten in the vaccine roll-out.
I’m so glad that effective vaccines are now available.
However, from where I sit, we cancer patients have been forgotten in Washington state.
We have children who need to return to school.
Spouses who are essential workers go to work, keeping our communities running, and then return home to care for us and our children.
Age is an important determinant of who will be most severely affected by COVID, and I’m so glad we have vaccinated our most elderly.
However age is not the only factor.
Cancer patients are more likely to catch COVID, and are three times more likely to die of COVID than other hospitalized patients.
If the cancer patient is under 65, and has no other health conditions, as if they need this, Washington state, including Clallam and Jefferson counties, prioritizes them to get the vaccine with the general public, likely this summer or fall.
This is just wrong, and we can do better.
I ask folks to contact Gov. Jay Inslee to follow the recommendation of the Department of Health and Human Services and prioritize the most medically vulnerable people among us.
Allison Graves
Port Townsend