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They cannot eat in the same restaurants. They travel in separate buses. They are in different locker rooms. That’s the situation between NBA players who are vaccinated and those who decided, for different reasons, not to take the vaccine. These restrictions were called “nonsense” by Orlando Magic player, Jonathan Isaac, during an interview with The Blaze.
The player argues that, at the moment of truth, both vaccinated and unvaccinated players end up playing together on the court, where they have constant physical contact and, in any case, it is a riskier place to spread an eventual contagion.
“The league will continue its strict regulations this season for unvaccinated players, and then says, you know, if you have to miss any games, because you’re not vaccinated in a certain city that requires it, you won’t get paid for those games. So is that something that I guess you’re just taking into stride and doing everything you can to kind of abide by your own conscience, but also, you know, submit to the regulations that are being put in place?”, asked Allie Beth Stuckey, the interviewer at The Blaze, to Isaac.
The basketball player said he had superficially mentioned his stance “in the press conference,” where he explained his reasons as to why he had not been vaccinated.
“I said, the NBA is free to make those regulations. And you know, as a member of the NBA, I’m going to follow them. But my only point would be, to me, it doesn’t logically follow for us then, to jump on the court, or for me to be at a different locker room than my teammates, but then follow into the same tunnel and to go out to the game. It does, it doesn’t really mean sense.”
“I don’t understand why natural immunity is ignored”
Stuckey asked Isaac if he had to be in a different locker room, in a different part of the bus, just because he didn’t take the vaccine, to which the player answered: “Exactly, I don’t know all of the regulations that have been laid out. But I know some of them would be, you know, I’m not allowed to go to like team functions. Or if the team is eating in a restaurant, I can’t eat in the same room as them.”
With the regulations in mind, Isaac again explained that, for him, then “it just doesn’t logically follow for us then to get on the court together. And then again, for natural immunity to be ignored, and then again, just this, all of this is coming about talking about a virus was such a high survival rate.”
After that, the interviewer asked Jonathan Issac if he had already had the virus; and the player took advantage of the question to set out his position on vaccines: “And even if you take the vaccine, it does not stop it, you know, infection and transmission. I’m not against the vaccine, I think there actually are people who should take it, people who are afraid for either, you know, their health status, their lifestyle, or just, you know what, I want to take this chance, I want to take this step to protect myself further,” Issac said.
In late September, Jonathan Isaac had gone viral for quite eloquently telling the press his decision not to vaccinate: “I understand that the vaccine would help if you catch COVID, you’ll be able to have less symptoms from contracting it. But with me having COVID in the past and having antibodies, with my current age group and physical-fitness level, it’s not necessarily a fear of mine,” Isaac said, who explained that, for him, getting vaccinated should be an individual decision.
“I am not anti-vax. I’m not anti-medicine. I’m not anti-science. I didn’t come to my current vaccination status by studying Black history or watching Donald Trump press conferences. I thank God, I’m grateful that I live in a society where vaccines are possible and we can protect ourselves and have the means to protect ourselves in the first place. But with that being said, it is my belief that the vaccine status of every person should be their own choice and completely up to them without bullying, without being pressured or without being forced into doing so,” Isaac concluded.
Emmanuel Alejandro Rondón is a journalist at El American specializing in the areas of American politics and media analysis // Emmanuel Alejandro Rondón es periodista de El American especializado en las áreas de política americana y análisis de medios de comunicación.
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