44 | JULY 22 • 2021 

HEALTH

A

well-known obser-
vation: In medieval 
times, many rabbis 
worked as physicians. Less well-
known: In our own times as 
well, several Orthodox rabbis 
are also physicians. A few rabbi/
physicians told the Jewish News
what Jewish law advises about 
COVID-19 vaccines.
Aaron Glatt earned rab-
binical ordination from 
Rabbi Avraham 
Tzvi Wosner at 
Machon LeTorah 
Vehora’ah and his 
medical degree 
from Columbia 
University College 
of Physicians 
and Surgeons in 
New York. He is professor of 
infectious diseases and hospital 
epidemiologist at Mount Sinai 
South Nassau (N.Y.) and assis-
tant rabbi at Young Israel of 

Woodmere (N.Y.).
Rabbi Dr. Glatt strongly 
advises that people who are 
able to get vaccinated as soon as 
possible and rejects arguments 
for delaying or refusing.
“Unfortunately, there are 
many misguided, not scientif-
ically based patently incorrect 
high-quality glossy pamphlets 
that are being circulated,
” he 
said. “I have not seen any 
that identify the names of the 
‘expert’ physicians purport-
edly writing these statements, 
which are in total opposition 
to the true experts in infectious 
diseases who 100% support 
COVID vaccination efforts. 
“They misquote or misrep-
resent the true facts and unfor-
tunately continue to propagate 
information that is outright 
100% false, such as vaccines 
cause infertility or cause people 
to shed virus that infect other 

people. Both are nonsense with 
zero evidence to support such 
falsehoods.
”

‘GUARD YOURSELF’
Rabbi Dr. Shalom Schlagman 
earned rabbinic ordina-
tion at Rabbi 
Isaac Elchanan 
Theological 
Seminary, affili-
ated with Yeshiva 
University in New 
York, and his 
medical degree 
at the University 
of Rochester (N.Y.) School of 
Medicine. He serves as a fel-
low in Hospice and Palliative 
Medicine at the University of 
Rochester. 
Schlagman takes questions 
about the COVID-19 vaccine 
personally. 
“My own uncle, my mother’s 
brother, who was a medically 

fragile person, was taken from 
us last spring when he was 
infected in the first COVID-19 
surge,
” he said.
“
As a resident in a regional 
quaternary-care academic med-
ical center, I cared for patients 
whom we could not save from 
the disease. I literally watched 
people succumb to the infection 
despite our most advanced and 
aggressive medical care, and 
I witnessed others who lan-
guished in our ICU for weeks 
or months and whose subse-
quent recovery was complicated 
by strokes, blood clots or infec-
tions from their prolonged bed-
bound state. 
“I cared for teenagers and 
children, who, with minimal 
other symptoms of COVID-19 
infection, found themselves 
in the ICU weeks after initial 
recovery, now the victims of 
MIS-C, a complication of the 

Doctors who are also 
rabbis recommend 
COVID-19 vaccines — 
“It’s a mitzvah.”

Roll Up 
Your 
Sleeves!

LOUIS FINKELMAN
CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Rabbi
Dr. Aaron 
Glatt

Rabbi
Dr. Shalom 
Schlagman