Since the start of the pandemic, I’ve been requiring that both myself and my surrogate partner therapy clients take a Covid test before each session. Starting in 2025, I’ve decided to stop requiring Covid tests before we meet. I want to emphasize that I did not make this change to my Covid policy because I think Covid is no longer “a big deal;” the only reason I’m changing this policy is that I’ve found rapid tests have not been effective at preventing exposures.
I still take Covid — and all transmissible illnesses — very seriously. The pandemic opened my eyes to the ways our society systemically dismisses and ignores those with chronic illness and disability (I strongly recommend this article on “The Great Forgetting” by badass disabled activist and writer Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha). Rather than waiting for the pandemic to “be over” so I could go back to my normal life, I started shifting the way I moved through the world.
I used to be someone who never got the flu shot; I thought to myself, “I’ll be fine if I get the flu — I’d rather get it than deal with getting the vaccine.” The thing is, it’s not about you in specific and how you’ll fare if you get sick. It’s about all the people you might pass an illness to: at the grocery store, in the elevator, via the gas pump or sink faucet you touched. The chronically ill, disabled, and elderly folks who are much more vulnerable than you.
The reality is that 40 percent of Americans have multiple comorbidities, so the myth that the CDC perpetuated when it ended Covid restrictions in 2023 — that most of us will be totally fine now that we have the vaccine — is patently false. As of April 2024, roughly 17 million Americans were still grappling with effects of long Covid. When are we going to stop treating people with disability and chronic illness like they’re some strange outlier and recognize that they’re our neighbors, our friends, our family members — and often ourselves? It’s high time we actually start centering the needs of the most vulnerable in the way we structure our society.
I am still taking many precautions against Covid and other transmissible illnesses like the flu; I wear a mask inside stores, I stay home and avoid indoor hangs if I have symptoms of an illness, I wash my hands every time I come home, I get my vaccines, and I’m still limiting how frequently I eat indoors at restaurants.
While I know many of my clients are not taking the same precautions I am, I do expect them to take my health and needs seriously — just as one would with a partner. My job carries specific risks if I get sick; I stand to expose many clients and lose a significant chunk of income if I fall ill. For clients who don’t have a private practice and don’t do such physically intimate work, those impacts might not be obvious.
Covid policy for clients
I expect my clients to inform me if they have any symptoms of an illness, like the sniffles, a sore throat, or nausea, so that we can decide together if it feels safe enough to meet. I always offer online sessions when an in-person session is not possible — and trust me, there’s plenty we can do together online — so being sick doesn’t mean we have to miss out on connection.
I request that my clients take reasonable precautions in the 3 – 4 days before our session: wearing a mask while commuting on public transportation, at indoor exercise classes, or while attending indoor events with more than 12 people; avoiding high-risk environments like restaurants, bars, and clubs; and not spending time with friends or loved ones who are presenting symptoms.
I strongly encourage my clients to get vaccinated every fall, against both Covid and the flu. I recommend the Novavax vaccine, which is widely reported to have far fewer side effects than the vaccines that were available early on, like Pfizer and Moderna — and that was certainly my experience of it.
A note on my personal experience of the Novavax vaccine: The effects of my first three vaccine shots were so extreme (not only flu-like symptoms for the day or two afterward, but the vaccines also disrupted my menstruation cycle for about a year after each shot and gave me extreme cramping with every cycle), that I actually didn’t get my vaccine in 2023 — I decided the benefits were not worth the negative impacts. When I heard reports that the Novavax vaccine had far less severe side effects, I decided to give it a shot (pun intended). I was blown away. The only symptoms I experienced the next day were some mild aching in my arm and a little bit of tiredness. I did not have any flu-like symptoms; despite having cleared my schedule to stay in bed all day, I ended up going on a long walk in the woods with my dog and running several errands. And best of all, it’s had absolutely no noticeable impact on my period.
TLDR
Covid is not over. Transmissible illnesses, like Covid and the flu, still cause serious health issues for millions of Americans, especially those who are chronically ill and disabled. Rather than going “back to normal,” we can all take reasonable harm reduction steps to protect the most vulnerable in our society.
My asks of my clients:
- Inform me if you have any symptoms of an illness before our session
- In the 3 – 4 days before our session:
- mask while on public transportation, at indoor exercise classes, or attending indoor events with more than 12 people
- avoid high-risk environments like restaurants, bars, and clubs
- avoid spending time with people who have symptoms of illness
- If possible, get the Novavax vaccine (which rarely causes severe side effects the way other vaccines do)
Katherine Yeagel 