Some people deserve a good shot... of guilt

"When the captain of the ship says, 'Women and children first,' they don't end off with, 'If you feel like it.' "-- unsolicited reader comment.

It is a scenario not unlike jumping the lifeboat queue on a sinking ocean liner.

Winnipeggers who are supposed to wait their turn are lining up in front of pregnant women and little children and the others who are supposed to be the priority for dwindling supplies of rationed H1N1 vaccine.

So why aren't some Winnipeggers letting pregnant women and little children, people of aboriginal ancestry and the health-compromised go first?

What are they thinking?

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People had been lining up at the Grant Park clinic three hours before it opened at 9:30 a.m.

By the time I arrived around noon, the wait was three hours and counting. Except for the obvious examples -- a pregnant woman, a two-year-old dressed up as a wand-waving Halloween fairy, or the 97-year-old man in a wheelchair -- it wasn't that easy to tell those who should be there from those who shouldn't.

At first, I randomly asked people if they were getting a shot and, if so, were they from a priority group.

One of the first I approached was a 32-year-old mother who was there to get a flu shot with her four-year-old daughter.

The daughter qualified because she was under five. The mother didn't because she was married.

"But I'm her primary caregiver. I'm concerned if I get sick, what will happen. I guess my husband could take care of her."

Then she said something surprising.

Her husband had been there earlier, but left because he felt guilty.

"He was thinking about it and then he saw the line and said, 'I'm not on the priority list.' "

I don't know if she decided to get the shot anyway.

But I know the next person I asked definitely did. The woman appeared to be about 40 and flashed a badge identifying her as a home-care worker for the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority.

She said she didn't know if that qualified her for a flu shot.

"But I don't care," she said sharply.

That sounded selfish and I told her so. As it turned out, when I checked with the WRHA, she qualified for both shots.

The flu shot.

And the one I gave her.

By the time I approached a couple who stood out because they weren't with kids, I had come up with a less confrontational question.

Or so I thought.

Do you know who's on the priority list?

"What priority list?" the woman replied haughtily over her shoulder. "There is no priority list. They'll give it to anyone."

Health Minister Teresa Oswald had expressly asked Manitobans to abide by the priority list for the sake of people who need the vaccine most. But this woman had decided to treat the WRHA's policy of not challenging anyone who asked for a flu shot as an open invitation.

How charming.

There was something about the father standing farther back in line with his children that also made him stand out.

Two of his three children were teenagers who don't qualify as a priority group. It became apparent Iraq-national Ahmed Al-Hassan knew his four-year-old qualified for the shot even if his healthy 13- and 18-year-old didn't.

But that it didn't matter to him.

There was nothing arrogant about his tone, though. Or his attitude.

He understood the government had its priority list. But he had his, too.

"The priority for me is my kids."

He said he wouldn't be getting the shot himself.

Then there was the 42-year-old woman who blushed when I approached her. Joan Gillespie said she wasn't on the priority list, but she wasn't waiting to get the flu shot either.

She was simply holding a place in line for someone who qualified for the shot, yet she was still uncomfortable.

"I feel funny even standing in line, holding someone's place," Joan said. "Because I don't belong here."

Joan went on.

"If there was a child sick with leukemia and a healthy person got the shot and the child was turned away, I would feel so bad and so guilty with the me-first attitude."

"ö "ö "ö

So why aren't some Winnipeggers letting pregnant women and little children go first? What are they thinking?

It can get complicated, but basically the answer is pretty simple.

They're thinking about themselves.

gordon.sinclair@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition October 31, 2009 A4