The authoritative survival guide for the un-jabbed (satire)

Raise a toast! The plandemic is officially over, at least where I live. I suppose there was no point in continuing after the main goals (wrecking small business and commercial real estate) had been achieved after less than two years of *cough* flattening the curve. More importantly, I made it through corona-free, un-jabbed, untested, and largely unmasked (except for that one time travelling in France, where I was trying to avoid their hefty fines for showing your face and ended up bed-ridden with acidosis for three days). My only regret is not being able to use all the unpronounceable names I had made up for cafes and restaurants. Milena Mrdczykamalova was my favorite, and I was just debating whether I had enough Mediterranean blood in me to pass for Aisha Al-Salem when the virus disappeared from one minute to the next. Bummer!

But not everyone is so lucky. In some other parts of the world, harsh general vaccine mandates are in place and many refuseniks can only hope for board and lodging on the state before they get bankrupted by hefty fines and the inability to secure employment. But do not despair! This great motivational article lays out how to get through life jab-free and why you need not fear the virus, nor the personalized lockdown your government has created for you.

Let me start by sharing my personal Covid journey (admittedly, I am taking some creative liberties here, but it could have happened in this way!). I was cheerfully making the most of a much-needed break in between lockdowns by getting lots of overdue repairs done in my apartment when the other shoe dropped. One of the workmen told me he wasn’t feeling well and was probably coming down with Covid and would lie down for a bit and keep me posted. I assured him I was as eager to see his test result as I was to audit his tax return, but my subtlety was lost on him. A few days later, confirmation of his positive test was sitting on my phone.

I was just debating whether I should go to gym one last time before starting my last journey, in other words, whether it was worse risking an arrest and exacerbating my hip injury, when my doorbell rang. I assumed the official-looking people outside were sophisticated trick burglars and tried to shoo them away, but they insisted. I was beginning to suspect that they might be public health officials trying to get me jabbed and tested, but it was much worse than that. They were the police! Millions of thoughts raced through my head. How did they get an arrest warrant so fast? Why weren’t they all in Downing Street looking for pizza crumbs? And where would they take me? I obviously don’t mind spending a few nights in jail, so long as I don’t need to share my cell with a serial rapist who has recently decided to self-identify as a woman, but I absolutely draw the line at being taken to some nasty, corona-infested hospital — especially when I am down with the virus myself.

I’m afraid I have neither a climax nor a brilliant denouement for you. As per my earlier spoiler alert, there was a happy ending after all. I never caught Covid, nothing has broken down in my apartment since, and my visitors turned out to be perfectly polite homicide detectives who were hoping for some information on a particularly gruesome murder in the neighborhood. See, I’ve told you, there’s nothing to be afraid of ever!

But back to my original subject on how you’re going to make it through un-vaxxed — although of course there’s no reason why you shouldn’t get the jab. It’s super convenient. You should have received multiple letters and text messages with easy-to-follow instructions in a size 30 font in 30 different languages from the health authorities by now. No lame excuses like “I can’t find my reading glasses” or “I only speak Farsi”. As an aside, I’m not sure what exactly we are supposed to do with the letters once we have booked our appointments, but you can’t go wrong by framing them and giving them a prominent space with viewing lights. The main point is to show respect. I read a heartbreaking story about an LA firefighter who might end up doing time after wiping his …. uh …. dorsal protuberance with his “no jab, no job” letter. So please, please, do not do anything rash, no matter how bad the toilet paper shortages get.

Even if you’ve misplaced your letter, you can do what is right for your country by trudging over to some vaccination center about once every three months for your booster, and occasionally for an extra special shot whenever there is a new variant that your friendly pharmaceutical industry has kindly developed a specific jab for. It sounds like a big hassle, but it’s really not that different from upgrading your phone all the time. Also, the jab is perfectly safe, heart inflammation warnings and a few anecdotal reports of fatal blood clots notwithstanding. And of course, you risk getting bigger, badder, more fatal clots if you actually catch the virus! (It’s the same logic as the birth control pill: it raises your clot risk, but to a lesser extent than pregnancy would)

Most blood clots won’t kill you if you catch them early. So, all you need to do to protect yourself, is to run to the nearest A&E if you get any pain or swelling in your leg, and ideally also every time you have a mild headache. Simply barge past the long line of headache patients queuing outside, confront the medical staff and demand a full body scan R I G H T — T H I S — M I N U T E. If there are no medical staff because they have all resigned over “no ja, no job” mandates, find the room where the scanners are kept, find out the model and make of the scanner you are going to use, download the user’s guide from the internet, and take your own pictures. (Ideally, you would want to be accompanied by a friend, as operating the scanner yourself while you are lying on the flatbed can be a bit tricky, especially if your hands are shaking because you are on the verge of freaking out over an imaginary blood clot). Once you have the pictures, you will need to interpret them. In all honesty, this part can be a bit tricky. There is a reason why radiologists go through many years of training, and you may not get to the same level just by watching a few YouTube tutorials. But then, you are not required to write elaborate reports on the findings either. Just assume that any dot you see is a blood clot and cut it out with a knife or scissors. (Wimps should pre-medicate with a pain killer). If you follow these instructions, you will be back on your feet in no time, and ready to queue for your next shot.

But let’s just assume for argument’s sake that despite all these compelling arguments in favor of the jab, you don’t want it. There could be many reasons. Maybe you are one of those Naturally Born Procrastinators who figure that since we will need at least another 326 boosters before the pandemic is over, you will wait until the 327th shot is available. Or maybe your best friend told you that after the jab he felt sicker than he did after his stag do, and it scared you because you have no idea what he consumed at his stag do. In fact, he may not even know. Heck, his drug dealer might not even know for sure! Whatever your reasons, you are probably getting a bit nervous about the repercussions. You have nightmarish visions of your future unemployed, friendless, homeless and hungry self, which is of course a gross exaggeration of the actual danger you face.

The good news is that the risk of losing your job permanently is quite low. Apart from all sorts of legal issues and religious exemptions, frontline workers have been resigning by the truckload, and there is a growing realization among government officials that actually having a workforce is useful as part of our wider social order. For example, here in the UK, widespread consensus to the effect that patients deserve to be handled by vaccinated doctors and nurses has recently been replaced by even more widespread consensus that under-staffing as a result of no-jab-no-job mandates don’t benefit anyone. So, the jab mandates for healthcare workers have been scrapped. If you are a firefighter, rest assured that most people would prefer un-jabbed firefighters extinguishing the flames to seeing their house burn down. The only frontline job that is a bit tricky is the police force. I have long held the opinion that we don’t need to jab cops; anyone who resents the idea of getting arrested by an un-jabbed policeman should just defer their next smash-and-grab until after the pandemic. But a kind soul has explained to me that I am missing the point: in countries with vaccine mandates for the general population, the police need to enter restaurants and barber shops to check vaccine passports — which they can’t do if they themselves are refused entry because they don’t have a vaccine passport. Tricky indeed. I am sure The Powers That Be will somehow manage to square the circle again.

And trust me, you will not starve to death. Vaccine passports are only needed for shops that sell overpriced designer brands. Supermarkets will always remain open to you. That is not to say that you will be able to shop at the same time as the Essentials (inevitably, in any place with a jab mandate, refuseniks are Non-Essentials, because they will either have been fired from their Essential jobs or never had one in the first place). You will probably need to go after hours, but don’t believe any of the scaremongering stories about supermarket shelves getting stripped bare. Sure, the steak and lobster will be gone, but I’m sure you can find some super-healthy, planet-friendly snacks — say, insect-based protein shakes (at least that’s the kind of product that I would expect to stay on the shelves, but then people never cease to surprise me). Also, you won’t be barred from renting an apartment just because you’re un-jabbed. Some new clauses may be inserted into your lease, for example a requirement to commission regular hospital-grade deep cleans to get rid of the bugs you’re spreading, but I can’t imagine that the bill would run into more than four figures.

As for your greatest fear: no, you will not be force vaccinated. It’s simply not practical. Conservative estimates suggest that approximately half the local police force would be required to hold down a typical 5-foot-2 female refusenik long enough for the nurse to give the jab (data on 5-foot-8 women and 6-foot-3 guys will be shared as soon as it becomes available). That would be a significant drain on police resource, particularly in areas where half of the force has quit over no-jab-no-job mandates. Again. London is a bit of an outlier because all police resource is currently concentrated in the Downing Street area, investigating cheese crumbs, wine stains and similar party clues. (Additionally, all police watchdog resource is currently tied up in their investigation of the police’s investigation of our fearless leaders’ work-hard-party-hard philosophy). I know what you’re going to say. Healthcare is not really a police matter — what about the military? Are they just there to protect Taiwan and Ukraine from annexation into territories with low vaccination rates? Again, trust me, the army has better things to do than to get into a fistfight with you. Where I live, all able-bodied troops are currently needed to stack supermarket shelves and fill gas stations.

Well, I hope that I could convince you that you will be able to purchase all essential goods and services irrespective of your vaccination status — provided you have enough purchasing power. Coming up next: The Authoritative Guide to Dealing with Weimar-style Hyperinflation. Stay tuned…