COVID jabs bring relief for vulnerable California farmworkers

US state made COVID-19 vaccines available to agricultural workers, who face heightened risks of contracting the virus.

Eva Garcia’s nerves were frayed after she heard false rumours that COVID-19 vaccines were dangerous. But the 35-year-old California farmworker, who had tested positive for and recovered from the virus herself earlier this year, decided that getting the vaccine was the right thing to do. The jab, she reasoned, would protect her, her husband and their children. Garcia, who is undocumented and has no access to healthcare in the United States, received a Moderna shot on March 2 at a mobile clinic set up at the farm where she harvests parsley. “I had COVID, I survived it, and I’m a lot happier knowing I’m protected,” she told Al Jazeera over the phone through a translator.