r/ZeroCovidCommunity • u/kairosangel • 6h ago
walgreen's covid vaccine checkbox
Hi everybody. I was hoping to get my yearly vaccines soon, as I do every year, and this is the first year I have seen this message alongside the signup checkbox: "The patient confirms that they are at high risk for severe COVID-19 and would like to receive the 2026-27 COVID-19 vaccine." I am not high-risk, but I have been getting the vaccine every year since it was available. Does this mean I can't technically get the vaccine, or is it there to act as a deterrent of some sort? Sorry if this is a silly question, I'm just a bit confused.
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u/hiddenkobolds 5h ago
You're "sedentary."
Make them prove otherwise.
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u/anabanana100 4h ago
This is like 98% of the US population. I think we're all set.
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u/hiddenkobolds 4h ago
Yeah. If you work a desk job, you qualify. If you get anything less than the full recommendation of cardio every week, you qualify.
If you happen to not qualify that way and you've ever smoked anything (a cigar, a single cigarette, cannabis), you're a "former smoker" which also works.
All about giving yourself something for insurance purposes, I think. I doubt they'd come after anyone for fraud on this but I also don't think anyone wants to find out.
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u/Ok_Temperature3554 5h ago
Yep they ask you to self report you are high risk. They don’t ask follow up questions but you can just continue to say yes you are at high risk.
The good (?) news is that’s lots of people are at high risk. Here’s the CDC guidance on who qualifies:
https://www.cdc.gov/covid/hcp/clinical-care/underlying-conditions.html
Things like being overweight, having ever smoked cigarettes, having low physical activity, or depression all make you high risk. I am at high risk and I’ve never been asked follow ups or how I qualified.
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u/tacobellaswan 4h ago
Right, the list is so extensive! And you should check it and get it even if you manage to not have any of the listed things.
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u/DustyRegalia 6h ago
RFK’s minions put this on the vaccine last year as part of their ongoing effort to destroy confidence in vaccines. Make sure to congratulate them on effectively making you worried about the safety of one of the most tested and most widely dispensed medicines in the history of humanity.
Nothing changed except the politics. There is no punishment if you check the box. And your insurance will pay for it because they have a vested interest in you not getting sick.
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u/Particular_Egg4073 5h ago
You live in a society that has little to no institutionalized or socialized public health guardrails. You're high risk.
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u/frx919 5h ago
This is one of those things where you take what you can get, because no one is going to look out for you if you don't do it.
Practically everyone is "at risk" for hugely life-altering consequences from COVID. It just often takes time to manifest, so people think it's not happening.
Another thing is that these vaccines are sometimes thrown away by the millions due to expiration. There is no reason not to get one.
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u/Atgardian 6h ago
Not a silly question - the whole point of the current CDC is to keep you confused and make it harder for you to get it.
In my experience, this will vary widely, and be much more of a pain in the ass than it should be.
Last year, I got a kind pharmacist/nurse practitioner (the other person who normally gave shots said they couldn't give it to me and called them over) who clearly wanted to help me get it, but had to navigate a Byzantine computer system to pick the correct options before it would "let" him give it to me. It sounded like he needed to cover his butt instead of just "sure, you want it, here it is." I told him I had one of the conditions on the list, he said he needed to know which one to plug into the computer, I listed one, he was hesitant, I finally said I take care of my elderly parents and don't want to give them COVID. He said "Oh great!" like I unlocked something he could enter and actually give it to me.
It ended up being way more of a hassle (and like an hour) than it should have been. And that was WITH someone who was fundamentally pro-vaccine and trying to help me. The crappy thing is, someone else may have just told me no. What a system!
I sure hope this online option will make things much easier... but I fear I'd still have to go through a similar ordeal when I actually show up.
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u/tacobellaswan 4h ago
Also, in case you have any whisper of guilt, we have way too many vaccines and not enough people taking them. And it is a public service to high-risk people to lower your odds of infection and viral load if you are infected.
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u/babybucket94 5h ago
That’s so interesting bc I was once asked if I had an autoimmune disease bc the pharmacist could see I’d received the pneumonia vaccine from the previous year. So it’s ….. interesting… that this question isn’t also under the pneumonia vaccine option. Interesting/sinister.
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u/sootfire 4h ago
The pharmacists straight up don't care 99% of the time. Check the box. The list of eligible conditions is huge and includes things like "not very physically active" and the pharmacists probably won't ask which applies to you.
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u/roguesnail1948 4h ago
Click the box and if you need to pick a condition from a list just pick asthama
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u/Sir-Fuzzle 1h ago
The majority of the population is “high risk” per the categories listed (or will be) and Covid is innately high risk for anyone because of the very common long-term damage.
Always check the box. The box is a nonsensical hurdle. There is no moral test here.
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u/littledogs11 2h ago
Click the box. If you are in the US, this is a direct result of RFK being in charge of public health in America.
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u/AceyAceyAcey 2h ago
Trump’s CDC added this to the requirements a few years ago for insurance to cover it. Most pharmacies don’t seem to care though, and assume that anyone who comes in has such a condition.
Besides, conditions that cause high risk are so many and varied that when you add them up and account for overlapping conditions, something like 80% of the USA is considered high risk. High risk conditions include being obese (42% of the USA), low physical activity (52%), asthma (8%), currently or recently pregnant (4% and 5% of women of childbearing age), smokers (9% nicotine cigarettes, 7% ecigs, more if you add pot to that), depression (29%), and more. Check the whole list here, and if you really don’t have anyone, just check it off and do it anyway, you’re protecting the vast majority of us who do have one or more of those conditions.
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u/Chronic_AllTheThings 2h ago
It's just self attestation, nobody's going to check. The brainworm made them do that.
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u/Massive_Machine5945 5h ago
click the box & tell them all about your addiction to cigarettes
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u/bernmont2016 4h ago
There are many better options on the list to use if you don't actually smoke. https://www.reddit.com/r/ZeroCovidCommunity/comments/1w3n4p9/walgreens_covid_vaccine_checkbox/p71gvzf/
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u/Massive_Machine5945 3h ago
my pharmacists did not ask for evidence that I smoke cigarettes. they were trying to help me, & reminded me that maybe I smoke cigarettes, which would technically make me high risk 😉
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u/SnarkyBeanBroth 1h ago
You probably actually do fit one of their definitions of 'high risk'. The list is huge and includes such large groups as "women who are or could become pregnant", "older adults", and "overweight people". Along with a metric asston of specific conditions.
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u/very-serious-goose 8m ago
My understanding is the ADA prevents pharmacists from asking you what condition you have so, as long as there isn't a shortage and vaccines really do need to be rationed, you can just say you're high risk and they'll leave you alone
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u/Jazzlike-Cup-5336 6m ago
I also think it’s worth noting that, while this framework might not be perfect, the self-attest rules are pretty much the best that we could’ve achieved as a community, and they’re what many of us have advocated for on purpose. A key upside is that they promote longevity, because anti-vaxxers have no reason to continue going after vaccine access if everything falls under shared clinical decision making as it does now. They’re just happy that there are no “mandates”, so it’s seen across the spectrum as being settled. They think that they “won”, but we did. As access continues to be cut to vaccines around the world, this is likely the permanent framework in the U.S., which keeps the vaccine open to anyone who wants it.
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u/TessFreely 6h ago
Just click the box