My Family’s Two-Week Battle With the Covid Delta Variant
Fighting Covid taught me more than reporting on it ever could
For the past year and a half, my life has been consumed by Covid. I have been covering the pandemic as a journalist, I’ve given lectures about it, read hundreds of studies, interviewed dozens of experts, and spoken to many who experienced the disease. I’ve also written 33 stories about Covid on Medium (luckily there’s a new list feature to bundle all of them up). I felt like I understood the virus; I felt I knew it. But little did I know, my knowledge with Covid would become much more intimate.
I received the second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine on Wednesday, July 14. I wasn’t actually supposed to get it. I’m 36, and the U.K. decided that those under 40 will receive an alternative vaccine due to the risks of blood clots caused by the AstraZeneca vaccine. However, as I received the first dose very early before these side effects were known, I was told I should carry on and receive the same type for my second dose as well.
I postponed my appointment several times. I tried seeing whether I could get a different type of vaccine for the second dose but with no luck. When I understood that the U.K. was going ahead with Freedom Day and canceling all Covid restrictions, I decided that the risks of…
