Howard Stern’s feelings towards COVID-19 anti-vaxxers hasn’t changed one bit since he lambasted them over their stance last year.
Stern railed against those who have chosen to remain unvaccinated on his Sirius XM radio show Wednesday, saying he wouldn’t even allow them to be admitted to the hospital. “If it was up to me, anyone unvaccinated would not be admitted to a hospital,” he said, per Variety. “At this point, they have been given plenty of opportunity to get the vaccine.”
According to Mayo Clinic, 63 percent of the U.S. population is fully vaccinated, with 75.1 percent receiving at least one dose.
“[People] have been told you will die if you get the vaccine. Some of you will live, but most of you will die. [These people] don’t trust our government. They think that there’s some conspiracy to turn them into a magnet or something like this,” Stern said. “They think they are going to become magnetized if they take the vaccine. I’ve taken this vaccine three times, and the worst side effect is for a day, I had a little bit of a headache.”
White House press secretary Jen Psaki told a reporter during a press briefing earlier this month that the unvaccinated are 17 times more likely to be hospitalized and 20 times more likely to die, compared to those who have received their shots.
Stern went on to say that if it were up to him, hospitals would turn away the unvaccinated and they would “go home and die.”
“No one’s sitting there conspiring against you,” Stern continued. “Americans don’t want to create a vaccine that’s going to turn you into a robot or magnetize you. There’s enough Americans now have taken it. Look at us as a sampling where nothing has happened to us. It’s time for you to get it. Now, if you don’t get it, in my America, all hospitals would be closed to you. You’re going to go home and die. That is what you should get. Absolutely.”
Before the Biden administration attempted to impose a vaccine mandate for large private companies that was blocked by the Supreme Court last week, Stern argued for implementing such an order on his show in September. “As I remember, when I went to school, you had to get a measles vaccine. You had to get a mumps vaccine,” he explained.
His patience with anti-vaxxers had already worn thin, and even back then, Stern wanted hospitals to turn them away.
“The other thing I hate is that all these people with COVID who won’t get vaccinated are in the hospitals clogging it up,” he said. “So like, if you have a heart attack or any kind of problem, you can’t even get into the E.R. And I’m really of mind to say, ‘Look, if you didn’t get vaccinated [and] you got COVID, you don’t get into a hospital.’ Go fuck yourself, you had the cure and you wouldn’t take it.”