Finding an open appointment to get the Covid-19 vaccine was a headache, so 90-year-old Fran Goldman wouldn’t be put off by some snow. The walk was three miles in each direction. She dressed in layers and picked up walking sticks. “It wasn’t easy,” Ms. Goldman told the Seattle Times. “It was a challenge.”
Did we mention she had a hip replaced last year? But a hike in the snow is worth it for two great-grandchildren. “I can’t wait to hold them,” Ms. Goldman told the newspaper. Now there is an antidote to the articles about public skepticism about the vaccines. Surveys that hesitated last year were remarkable, but two months after the start of the US vaccination program, the story turns to the question.
Here’s another, though not quite as uplifting. In Florida, which prioritizes people 65 and older, two women, ages 34 and 44, went to an Orange County immunization site “ dressed as grandmas, ” an official said Thursday. That made national headlines, although it is not clear whether it was an exaggeration.
Body camera video released Friday shows little disguise, but both women had face masks and goggles, and one of them was wearing a gray hat. That said, the women “had adjusted their birth years to their vaccination records to bypass the state system,” the Orlando Sentinel reported. They had apparently already received a first vaccination dose, but the second was denied and warned of violations.
A heroic story and an evil story. Still, both are good signs of vaccine demand, as ending this pandemic hinges on getting millions more shots into millions of arms.