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Unvaccinated TikToker Who Died of COVID Spent Last Days Urging Followers to Get the Vaccine

An unvaccinated TikTok creator who died of COVID-19 spent her final days desperately pleading with her followers to get the vaccine so they "won't end up in the hospital like me."

Megan Alexandra Blankenbiller died on Aug. 24, just nine days after she had made her final TikTok video that urged viewers to get quickly vaccinated and protect themselves from COVID-19.

The two-minute video, which was filmed from Blankenbiller's hospital bed and shared to her @atasteofalex account, showed the 31-year-old struggling to get her words out as she said, "I shouldn't have waited."

"I think if you're even 70 percent sure that you want the vaccine, go get it. Don't wait, go get it," she said. "Because hopefully, if you get it, then you won't end up in the hospital like me, okay?"

According to Blankenbiller, she held off on getting the vaccine right away because she wanted to get inoculated at the same time as her family members.

RELATED: Father of 5 Dies of COVID: 'I Should Have Gotten the Damn Vaccine'

"I did not get vaccinated. I'm not anti-vax," Blankenbiller explained in her video. "I was just trying to do my research. I was scared, and I wanted me and my family to all do it at the same time. And as I'm sure you guys know, it's hard to get everyone to agree on something if people feel differently."

"I do think it was a mistake," she added.

Megan Alexandra Blankenbiller
Megan Alexandra Blankenbiller

tiktok

Blankenbiller started documenting her experience with COVID-19 on Aug. 13, when she shared posted a TikTok video of herself sitting in a hospital room. She wrote in the caption: "The 'vid got me guys. DO NOT WAIT TO GET VACCINATED! Go now!!"

A day later, Blankenbiller shared two videos of herself in a hospital bed.

RELATED VIDEO: Comedian Dies After Filming Video About His Experience with COVID from Hospital Bed: 'This Is No Joke'

"I've been here since for early Friday morning," she said in one clip, "and all I've been hearing are the moans and screams of people in pain — people, I'm assuming, that have lost people that they love because I know what that's like personally and what that sounds like."

Blankenbiller's family told WebMD that the Florida-based content creator — who has more than 15,000 followers on TikTok — had scheduled a vaccination appointment with her mother and two sisters, but fell ill before she could get the shot.

"Her final video really showed a lot of who she was," her sister, Rachel Blankenbiller, said. "She was selfless — the type of person who used her final days to help others."

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