Bradley Beal’s argument against coronavirus vaccines: They prevent only hospitalizations and death.
First of all, Beal is wrong. Vaccinated people are five times less likely to contract coronavirus than unvaccinated people. Vaccinated people are less likely than unvaccinated people to spread coronavirus.
But, after revealing he’s unvaccinated, Beal used coronavirus cases to question reporters at Wizards media day.
#Wizards Bradley Beal's full comments when asking why vaccinated people are getting COVID.
— Allif Karim (@AllifKarim) September 27, 2021
@WDVMSports @WDVMTV pic.twitter.com/LqIBDG5tnJ
“I would like an explanation to people with vaccines – why are they still getting COVID if that’s something that we are supposed to highly be protected from?” Beal said. “It’s funny that it only reduces your chances of going to the hospital. It doesn’t eliminate anybody from getting COVID. Right?”
A reporter emphasized that vaccinated people are less likely to die or be hospitalized.
“OK,” Beal said, grinning as if he perfectly set up a gotcha. “But you can still get COVID.”
As if getting hospitalized or dying is some trivial consideration.
Severe illness and death are the entire reason this pandemic is so serious. If it weren’t so harmful to people’s health, coronavirus wouldn’t be such a big deal. Other viruses have spread rampantly without being as destructive. It’s only because of those severe outcomes a positive/negative designation for coronavirus matters.
Bradley Beal doesn’t envision him not getting the vaccine being a distraction for the Wizards.
— Chris W. Crouse (@ChrisWCrouse) September 27, 2021
Added that he understands the COVID situation perfectly well.@FortyEightMins || #DCAboveAll
Beal’s full answer: pic.twitter.com/kcajeFzUOk
Beal, who missed the Tokyo Olympics, also confirmed he previously had coronavirus. He said that didn’t factor into his decision not to get vaccinated, though he correctly noted his prior infection created a resistance against future infection. That said, even among people who previously had coronavirus, vaccinated people are more protected than unvaccinated people.
“Some people have bad reactions to the vaccine,” Beal said. “Nobody likes to talk about that. And what happens if one of our players gets the vaccine and they can’t play after that or they have complications after that? Because there are cases like that. But I feel we don’t talk about those as heavily, because they’re so minute maybe. But they are existent.”
Once again, Beal is wrong but stumbled onto a great point. Vaccine skeptics love to talk about bad reactions to the vaccine. But we don’t talk about those much, because – as Beal said – they’re so minute. Especially when compared to more 690,000 people dying in the United States alone from coronavirus.