Statue of John Keats at Guy’s Hospital
It is now almost a year since I had the coronavirus and last week a letter arrived inviting me for a vaccination. Immediately, I booked the next available appointment at the nearest location and then cycled down to Guy’s Hospital at London Bridge yesterday to get it.
I joined the long line of people in masks, snaking through the hospital courtyard and leading into a large white steel-frame tent. There was collective expectation in the air and this sense of excited anticipation was heightened by the low-angled sunlight, blinding us in the queue and causing us all to raise our hands, shielding our eyes from the light as we shuffled forward to ascend the ramp.
The man supervising the line asked me to show him the text on my phone with my reference number, but when I reached the entrance of the tent another man asked my name. When I gave my surname, he checked it on a list and then called my first name through to another seated a desk inside. I was startled at this sudden transition from a number to a family name to my own name. In a moment, I had transformed from one of the masses to an individual and the nature of the experience changed from anonymous to personal.
Thirty metal chairs were arranged in lines, two metres apart, and, once I had sanitised my hands, I sat down upon an empty chair. An attendant walked up and down the lines of chairs, wiping them between occupants. In front of us was a large screen with our names upon it and, to one side, another ramp leading to where the vaccinations were being administered.
I cast my eyes around at my fellows. We were alone in this moment, carers and loved ones were not admitted. No-one spoke as we sat impassively watching our names move up the screen. When they reached the top of the list, each person stood up in turn and walked through to into the next room without looking back.
The diverse list of names revealed the range of our cultural origins and as I looked around the room, there were young and old, and those who were infirm and those evidently fit and healthy. I tried to guess which name belonged to which person from their appearance but failed. I could not discern any common factor between us, beyond that we were all human and Londoners.
Time was suspended as we sat in our shared reverie punctuated only by repeated summons to the next room every few minutes. We were waiting but we were calm. I imagined that perhaps this was how the afterlife could be and that the attendants were angels, shepherding us towards a reckoning.
Quickly, as chairs emptied, were wiped and filled again with new occupants, I moved from being the newest arrival to the one who had been waiting the longest. Then my name came up with the number of the station where I would receive my vaccine, and I stood and walked through into the next room, sanitising my hands again as I did so.
Cubicles with deep blue curtains lined a wide passageway and I walked inside to meet a young nurse who closed the curtain behind us. We sat on either side of a desk while she asked me questions and entered my answers into the computer.
Even though I have lived with the assumption of a degree of immunity since I recovered, which has reduced my fear of the virus, I was surprised at the strength of my emotions on receiving the vaccination. Yet these overwhelming feelings of gratitude were sublimated into a technical conversation about whether I had any recent experience of flu symptoms or whether I had allergies. I was struck that the nurse showed no sign of weariness and spoke to me as if I were the first person to whom she had ever asked these questions.
Automatically, I unbuttoned my shirt so the vaccination could be administered upon my upper arm. The nurse wrote the details of my vaccination upon a small card, the size of calling card, with the date for my next shot. ‘Now take good care of this,’ she said as he handed it over. Once I placed the card in my pocket, it acquired the quality of a magic talisman that will keep me safe.
When I walked back outside into the afternoon sunlight again and was alone, my breath faltered as I filled with a powerful surge of relief. I removed my mask. I felt blessed, as if the vaccination had been a religious experience. I felt relief that I have been fortunate enough only to suffer mild symptoms of the virus and recover last year. And relief that – after the tragedy of over two and a half million people who have died – the end of this collective global nightmare is now in sight.
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