By Danielle Ray, Senior Reporter
According to the Town Clerk’s office the town population is 7,947 people. Town Health Agent David Favreau said that 4,276 of those individuals in Sterling “have been fully vaccinated,” well over 50%.
“Sterling has not reported any positive cases in the past two weeks,” Favreau said on June 1.
Longtime physician Timothy Gibson has a message for those hesitant to get the COVID-19 vaccine – there is over a decade of scientific research and development behind it.
“While the vaccine is new, the development of the science of mRNA has been ongoing for more than 10 years,” Gibson said.
Gibson warns that much like chicken pox prior to the vaccine coming out in 1995, COVID is “so contagious that anyone who is not vaccinated is very likely to eventually get COVID.”
“However, compared to Varicella, with a rate of death 1 in 35,000 or the flu with a rate of death 1 in 480, the rate of death when you contract COVID is much, much greater at 1 in 62,” he continued. “The available vaccines are very effective at preventing a patient from getting COVID in the first place, but perhaps more importantly, they are nearly 100% effective at preventing serious and fatal cases of COVID.”
Gibson has been a pediatrician at UMass Memorial Hospital for 22 years and is the school physician for the towns of Shrewsbury, Sutton and Leicester. He reached out to the Sterling Board of Health this winter to offer his medical expertise after having COVID himself.
“I wanted to help out with the effort to prevent others from getting it,” he said. “My role primarily has been as an advisor for town-sponsored vaccination clinics.”
Gibson said he is glad to be part of helping to spread accurate information about the COVID-19 vaccine.
“I think that forums just like this, as well as our vaccine clinics, show people in town that their friends and neighbors are getting vaccinated safely,” he said.
When asked if he feels we can reach herd immunity in the state and country, and if so when, Gibson said the commonwealth is on the right path.
“Rates of vaccination in Massachusetts are likely to be higher than in most other states, and combined with patients who have already had COVID, the percentage of the population who has some form of immunity is likely to be high enough here to keep COVID cases low for the foreseeable future.”
Gibson said that as a doctor who works mostly in a hospital, he was offered the COVID vaccine in the first wave in December of last year but decided to wait a bit.
“Given that I had COVID in November, as well as the fact that the vaccine was in short supply at that time, I waited so that others who had no immunity at all at that point could receive the vaccine,” he said. “As the supply picked up, I received both doses of the Pfizer vaccine in March and had no side effects from it.”
Gibson said the town of Rutland’s collaborative vaccine clinics have been “instrumental in taking the lead on offering vaccines to all of the Wachusett-area towns.”
“The BOH clinics in town for first responders and for seniors have been very successful, and residents now can receive a COVID vaccine at a variety of sites, from the larger state-run vaccine centers, and now also at local pharmacies.”
Gibson said the teenage daughter of one of the groomsmen in his wedding contracted COVID and gave it to her 49-year-old father.
“He was previously completely healthy,” Gibson said. “He has now been on a ventilator for two months and they are talking about a lung transplant for him if he survives. I am worried about how that scenario will affect her for the rest of her life. Even if you are hesitant about the vaccine, consider getting it for the health of those around you.”
For more information visit https://www.mass.gov/info-details/massachusetts-covid-19-vaccine-information.