Rockville Centre Diocese Discourages Johnson & Johnson Vaccine

ROCKVILLE CENTRE, NY — Long Island's Roman Catholic diocese is discouraging members from getting the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine following a recommendation by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

The recommendation to clergy and laity from the Rockville Centre diocese was sent Wednesday and said the newest vaccine is "morally compromised" and asks Roman Catholics to get the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines instead.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine received emergency use authorization two weeks ago and is being hailed as a crucial player in ending the pandemic because unlike earlier vaccines, it is administered in only one dose and can be stored at higher temperatures. Like Modern and Pfizer, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine reduced the fatality rate of the coronavirus by 100 percent compared to placebo and kept all recipients from being hospitalized.

But the Rockville Centre diocese memo, penned by Lisa Honkanen, M.D., Director of the Office of Human Life, Family & Bioethics, said, "Ideally, a vaccine will have no connection at any stage of development or production with the use of cell lines initially derived from an aborted fetus. Unfortunately, none of the four COVID-19 vaccines either already or soon-to-be available to the public meets this criterion. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, using mRNA technology, do not use morally compromised cell lines in the design, development, or production of the vaccine.

"The Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca vaccines, using viral vector technology, are more morally compromised because they rely on cell lines produced from a past abortion in the design, development and production stages of that vaccine as well as in a confirmatory test. Therefore, their connection to abortion, albeit remote, is both greater and on-going."

The memo goes on to say that the official recommendation is to choose an alternative vaccine, but if that cannot be done, it is still morally permissible to get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The memo ends by saying "there is no moral obligation to vaccinate."

According to University of Nebraska infectious disease doctor James Lawler, "fetal cell lines are cells that grow in a laboratory. They descend from cells taken from elective abortions in the 1970s and 1980s. Those individual cells from the 1970s and 1980s have since multiplied into many new cells over the past four or five decades, creating fetal cell lines. Current fetal cell lines are thousands of generations removed from the original fetal tissue. They do not contain any tissue from a fetus."

The vaccine rollout has already been strained by a persistent but declining vaccine reluctance, with one in five Americans saying in a February study that they will not get the vaccine voluntarily.

Other religious denominations on Long Island such as the Episcopal Diocese of Long Island have encouraged members to seek any available vaccine. Diocese Bishop Provenzano wrote in January: "Receiving the vaccine is not only a matter of public health, it is an act of unselfish care for the stewardship of the lives of the people around us. It is a hopeful sign after a difficult year. As soon as my primary care physician notifies me that it is available, I will without hesitation receive the COVID-19 vaccine myself."

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops did include a strong pro-vaccination message in their March 2 statement.

“While we should continue to insist that pharmaceutical companies stop using abortion-derived cell lines, given the world-wide suffering that this pandemic is causing, we affirm again that being vaccinated can be an act of charity that serves the common good.”

Pope Francis was quoted in January on Italian television saying, "I believe that morally everyone must take the vaccine. It is the moral choice because it is about your life but also the lives of others."