The U.S. is fucking up vaccine distribution on just about every level. It’s not much of a shock, given the government failures at every stage of the COVID-19 pandemic, which were predictable from the very beginning. It is, however, extremely frustrating, and as millions of us wait for our doses, we’ve developed a running joke: Put someone else in charge of the rollout. Suggestions so far include drug dealers, “a lesbian,” Hollywood assistants and Spirit Halloween.
Put drug dealers in charge of the vaccine rollout
— JAKE FLORES (@feraljokes) January 21, 2021
I’m just gonna say what needs to be said: we need to put a lesbian in charge of vaccine distribution.
— Yashar Ali ? (@yashar) December 30, 2020
Just put Hollywood assistants in charge of the vaccine rollout, we’d have that shit handled
— Erin Conley (@Erinsk8) January 5, 2021
Put Spirit Halloween in charge of pop-up vaccine clinics
— Dan McQuade (@dhm) January 5, 2021
put U2 in charge of distributing the vaccine they put a whole fucking album on everyones iphone
— kristofer thomas (@itskristofer) January 5, 2021
Any of these appointments would seem more promising than the months ahead. And finally, this week, someone put the meme into practice: Mayor Will Haynie of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, called Jerry Walkowiak, manager of the local Chick-fil-A, to help untangle the hour-long traffic at a vaccine site. The solution had been staring us in the face the whole time: Who better to run your drive-thru than fast food employees? Jerry, of course, immediately got things back on track.
Chic Fil A manager Jerry Walkowiak donating his professional drive thru experience to help our vaccination program in Mt Pleasant today. When you need help, call the pros. pic.twitter.com/63RvcVR8KJ
— Will Haynie (@willhaynie) January 22, 2021
Behind the scenes: We spoke to the local Chick-Fil-A manager who stepped in to get a backed up drive-thru vaccination site back on track. https://t.co/G0oWCpRKgL
— Chase Laudenslager (@News2Chase) January 27, 2021
Chick-fil-A manager Jerry Walkowiak helped identify a traffic bottleneck in a COVID-19 vaccine line and speed up an hourlong wait time to just 15 minutes or so.https://t.co/L2FUOHhaiz
— The Post and Courier (@postandcourier) January 27, 2021
At a moment when Democrats are moving to (slowly) raise the national minimum wage to $15 an hour, tiresome blowhards are logging on to their social accounts every day to argue that Americans earning the base rate — and fast food workers in particular — don’t deserve more money. Sometimes it’s framed as fear of price inflation: There’s the myth that Taco Bell will have to charge $38 for burritos to fairly compensate its staff, for example. Sometimes it’s simple, classist contempt for the people who make your hamburgers: How dare they hope to afford the basic amenities in life?! But lo and behold, it is the cooks and cashiers of McDonald’s et al who have put their lives at significant risk to feed a nation through this crisis, and it is the franchise managers who know how to turn a dysfunctional vaccine center into a model of efficiency.
I bet if they borrowed a couple of fast food restaurant managers to help with vaccine distribution that joint would be smooth. And they know how to deal with unruly folk.
— Dr. Shonda Goward (@shondagoward) January 14, 2021
I mean, really, if you’ve ever seen how a Popeyes employee handles an abusive drunk customer at 2 a.m., you’re aware that the job requires almost limitless patience and the authoritative muscle to maintain order in times of chaos. We should already be paying this labor force triple their current wages to sort out the mess wherever a line for essential health care is backed up. Oh, and they should get priority themselves, too.
That’s it, final answer: Put fast food workers in charge of vaccine stuff. Then our only problem will be running out of the damn shots.
Miles Klee
Miles Klee is MEL’s resident tank-top dirtbag, shitposter and meme expert. He’s also the author of the novel ‘Ivyland’ and a story collection, ‘True False.’
