As we know, Covid-19 has been a prominent factor in our society since the beginning of 2019. At the start of the pandemic, Donald Trump, a Republican was in office. With so much unknown, the United States tried to come up with a plan to effectively establish a vaccine and healthcare options to aid Americans. However, the pandemic was rapidly spreading across America and more and more people began to get sick.

(AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

This led to people having to not attend work, school, social functions, etc. The government had to come up with a plan to aid citizens that had missed work. With the mass inclination of government involvement to help ease the consequences of the pandemic, covid-19 became more of a political priority than a health priority.

The mass spread of available vaccinations and the decision to become vaccinated now align with people’s political affiliations. For example, those who are not vaccinated are affiliated with the republican party and those who are vaccinated are more associated with the democratic party.

Although there are exceptions to these stereotypes, we can see that there has been an increasing political divide when it comes to the vaccine. Rather than a health choice, like the flu vaccination, the covid-19 has been associated with a political agenda.

Furthermore, a lot of universities and workplaces are requiring the upload of vaccination status. For example, Pennsylvania state requires the submission of vaccination status. If you do not upload this information you can face penalties.

Lastly, we see people not wanting to follow health care protocols because of the political association. At the beginning of the pandemic, a lot of people were coherent and followed masking protocols. People took social distancing more seriously. However, as the years went on, people are feeling the need to align politically with their party. Fewer people are following social distancing protocols and masking requirements because of the political affiliation that is behind it. However, if the vaccination was presented as a healthcare problem more people would follow protocols for the sake of their own health.

Overall, the pandemic itself has become a political priority. It was the foundation of the 2020 election and led to peoples’ votes being heavily focused on covid. We already had such a strong political divide that it only got worse with the covid-19 political agenda.

Hopefully, as the pandemic begins to come to an end we can come together and begin to be united once again.

Photo sources: Pew Research Center