COVID-19 vaccination status is now a deal breaker for singles — but not because they’re afraid of getting sick

For Tatiana Swedek, the revelation came on a second date in September: The man she was seeing wasn’t vaccinated against COVID-19.

He told her he just hadn’t gotten around to making an appointment, she said.

A few days later, after going with him to get his first shot, she called it off with a long text message, which included her sincere hope that he return for his second dose.

Now, she said she screens all her potential dates in advance, asking them directly if they’re fully vaccinated. To her, she said, the seemingly simple question reveals a lot.

“Are they empathetic toward other people? Do they not only care about their own health and living their own lives but also about other people who may have weak immune systems?” the 28-year-old Fishtown resident said. “If you’re not going to do that for yourself or for others, we don’t really have the same values.”

As society adapts to life with COVID-19, vaccination status — as well as attitudes toward the pandemic in general — has become a common dating deal breaker. But not as much for reasons of personal safety or risk as they were once. According to matchmakers, dating coaches, and everyday people like Swedek, vaccination status can determine moral compatibility.

“The majority of our clients are vaccinated and feel strongly about dating someone who’s also vaccinated,” said Erika Kaplan, vice president of membership for the matchmaking service Three Day Rule, which works with hundreds of Philadelphia singles. “It’s less about fear and risk of contracting COVID, but more about someone who shares their values around science.”

» READ MORE: Two weeks, one map, two COVID landscapes: Where Pa. and N.J. stand

Across the country, about 41% of daters say they would not consider dating someone who is unvaccinated, while just over half say it wouldn’t matter to them, according to a Pew Research poll released in early April. Only 2% report that they would only date an unvaccinated person.

But in a city like Philadelphia, where 70% of residents are fully vaccinated, it is likely that a larger percentage of singles want to date only someone who is vaccinated, Kaplan said.

Meanwhile across the region, the importance of vaccination status differs by age, said matchmaker and dating coach Kristi D. Price, who also has some clients in Florida.

About half of her clients in their 20s and 30s are vaccinated, Price said, with some requiring that of potential partners and others having a more laissez-faire attitude. Meanwhile, nearly all of her clients above 40 have gotten their shots, she said, and they definitely want that in a match, too.

“Many of my clients, they feel if someone is not vaccinated, they’re doing a social disservice,” she said.

Julie Omole, owner of Eli Simone, a matchmaking service primarily for Black women in the Mid-Atlantic and South, said the majority of her clients are vaccinated and want to date someone who also is immunized.

“It’s now become more of a political lean than anything else,” she said. “It’s kind of like [someone] saying, ‘I’m a Republican,’ when you’re trying to date a Democrat.”

Sometimes, shared values around COVID-19 vaccination and precautions can actually be the spark that starts a romance.

That’s what happened for Brian Sparks and Amy Beal, both 37, after they matched on the app Hinge in late 2020.

“I actually think in his dating profile, he stated something like, ‘You should be taking this pandemic seriously,’” Beal said. “I was like, ‘1. He’s cute and 2. Yes! I like that.’”

“That was pretty great,” she said with a laugh.

Concern about COVID-19 was of special importance for Beal, who has a health condition that could make her more susceptible to complications from the virus.

When vaccines became available a few months into their relationship, Beal was able to get a shot early due to her health condition, while Sparks drove four hours to Western Pennsylvania to get vaccinated as soon as he was eligible.

Now, the pair — he a product manager for Vertex and she an office manager for Aramark — are traveling the country together while working remotely.

They are glad, they said, that they waited to meet someone who shared the same values as them.

“Neither one of us were interested in meeting anyone who wasn’t taking it seriously,” Sparks said. “We viewed it as kind of a duty of citizenship, taking care of your fellow human. Anybody who didn’t have the empathy to do their part to end the pandemic, it revealed such a character flaw that we just weren’t interested.”