Claytoonz: Trust the science

DJ Ferguson is an anti-vaxxer. His father says his son “doesn’t believe in it.” According to his GoFundMe page, DJ has been in a Boston hospital since November suffering from a hereditary heart issue that causes his lungs to fill with blood and fluid. DJ needs a heart transplant. DJ does not believe in vaccines. What he does believe in are heart transplants and GoFundMe pages.

Ferguson has been removed from a transplant list, partly over his status as being unvaccinated from the coronavirus.

His father said, “My boy is fighting pretty damn courageously and he has integrity and principles he really believes in and that makes me respect him all the more. It’s his body. It’s his choice.” Yeah, but DJ is trying to make a choice with an organ that’s not from his body.

The person who donated the heart also made a choice with their body, except that person’s choice wasn’t selfish. Brigham and Women’s Hospital told the BBC in a statement: “Given the shortage of available organs, we do everything we can to ensure that a patient who receives a transplanted organ has the greatest chance of survival.”

The person who donated the heart probably made their choice, with their body, that their donation would be provided to a person with the greatest chance of survival, not some fucknut who ignores science over their petty politics.

Dr. Arthur Caplan, head of medical ethics at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, told CBS News that after any organ transplant a patient’s immune system is all but shut down and even a common cold can prove fatal.

Dr. Caplan said, “The organs are scarce, we are not going to distribute them to someone who has a poor chance of living when others who are vaccinated have a better chance post-surgery of surviving.”

There are over 100,000 people on waiting lists for organ transplants. Most of them won’t receive one. So why give one to someone who’s already made health choices detrimental to his survival? It looks like Mr. Ferguson already made his choice with his body.

The Centers for Disease Control says transplant candidates and their immediate circles should get vaccinated. Transplant candidates also need other vaccinations, such as the flu vaccine.

Many anti-vaxxers have started to trust the science when it’s too late, after catching the coronavirus. Their anti-science politics goes out the window when they start pleading with science to save their lives.

How does someone trust the science that will cut their chest open, remove their heart, insert a heart from a different person, stitch them back up, and send them back out into their world, but not trust a jab in the arm?

Anti-vaxxers need brain transplants.

Music Note: Today’s cartooning tunes were provided by Incubus and the J. Geils Band.