It's Not 'Encouraging' That Mostly the Disabled Die Despite Covid Shots
Janine Jackson
CDC director Rochelle Wallensky told Good Morning America (
">1/7/22) that it was "really encouraging news" that the vaccinated people dying from Covid were mostly "people who were unwell to begin with."
Asked on ABC's Good Morning America ( ">1/7/22) about "encouraging headlines that we're talking about this morning, this new study showing just how well vaccines are working to prevent severe illness," CDC director Rochelle Wallensky responded:
The overwhelming number of deaths, over 75%, occurred in people who had at least four comorbidities, so really these are people who were unwell to begin with. And, yes, really encouraging news in the context of Omicron; this means not only just to get your primary series but to get your booster series, and, yes, we're really encouraged by these results.
As the hashtag #MyDisabledLifeIsWorthSaving began trending on Twitter, disability rights activists like Ady Barkan were asking, "Are our deaths less tragic? Are our lives less valuable? Are we less human?"
Because they were picked up by right-wingers as proof that Covid concerns are overblown, media outlets like CNN (1/12/22) went into factcheck mode to explain that Wallensky's comments were distorted and taken from context.
 CNN's factcheck (1/12/22) focused on the false claim that Covid-19 is not a real threat—and not on the genuine implication that it's "really encouraging" when mostly people with health issues die from Covid when they're vaccinated.
Crucial seconds were missing from the tape, you see, which would clarify that Wallensky was referring specifically to the results of a study that found that a majority of deaths among the vaccinated involved comorbidities, not deaths overall. The subtext seemed to be that it's a confusing time and, just maybe, some people might be looking for something to be offended by.
Yeah, no. Information may certainly be unclear or shift with time, but priorities and attitudes remain—and those reflected in a statement that, within whatever subgroup, fatalities affecting primarily those with preexisting health issues are "good news" is disturbing. (For what it's worth, some of the things the CDC defines as comorbidities: diabetes, high blood pressure, Down's syndrome, cystic fibrosis, obesity, pregnancy and asthma.)
Susan Henderson of the Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund did not misunderstand the context of Wallensky's comment. She wrote in an open letter that the message from the CDC was not only
abhorrent, it perpetuates widely and wrongly held perceptions that disabled people have a worse quality of life than nondisabled people and our lives are more expendable.
When physicians hold these beliefs, and they do...the outcomes for disabled people, especially during a pandemic such as we are living through, can be fatal.
Messages from the head of the CDC must convey that all lives are valuable, and the loss of any life from COVID-19, whether it is the life of a person with a disability, an older adult, or a 32-year-old with no known disabilities, is a tragedy.
As Barkan said:
We live in the wealthiest country in history. We can afford to give healthcare to everyone. We can afford enough masks, tests and medical staff to keep everyone safe. But that requires seeing the full humanity of each of us.
News media could aid that effort if they would set aside the frame of back-and-forth political gotchas, and assume the value of all human beings, and our right to live full lives, as not a talking point but a premise.
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