Vaccine Hesitancy In CA: Just 11% Estimated To Be Reluctant

CALIFORNIA — While experts have pointed to many reasons why Californians may finally be seeing Gov. Gavin Newsom's "light at the end of the tunnel" as the state bounces back from the coronavirus, one factor may be giving the state a huge leg up — an overarching willingness among residents to get inoculated.

Just around 11 percent of Californians are estimated to be vaccine-hesitant, according to federal data. The metric is lower than all but four states — Hawaii, Vermont, Massachusetts and Connecticut, the Los Angeles Times reported.

California's rural and inland communities show slightly higher rates of vaccine hesitancy, according to federal data. Metrics were pulled from a Household Pulse Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau between March 3 and March 15.

Counties with the highest rates of vaccine hesitancy were Kings, Yuba, Siskiyou, Lassen, Plumas, Modoc and Del Norte. But even in those counties, rates were relatively low compared with the rest of the country. The most reluctant county appeared to be Kings.

Along the coast, rates were lower, especially on the northern end of the state. In San Francisco, only 7 percent are estimated to be vaccine-hesitant. Down south, 11 percent of Angelenos are estimated to be reluctant to be vaccinated.

There are many reasons why some Californians may be vaccine-hesitant, whether it stems from political beliefs or skepticism of pharmaceutical companies.

"Besides the fact that they are worried about the safety and efficacy because it was expedited, they feel the process has been politicized," Dr. Rupali J. Limaye, an associate scientist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told the Sacramento Bee. "They feel as though there is a bias here, that essentially many things that were done were done for political gain. And that leads to hesitancy."

For people of color, legacies of racism in the U.S. health care system have also contributed to hesitancy, Berkeley News reported.

"There’s a lengthy history of vulnerable populations in this country being subjected to unethical medical testing, and these ethical breaches can increase their sense of mistrust," Denise Herd, a professor of behavioral sciences at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health, told Berkeley News. "Bad experiences with doctors can also discourage people from looking to the medical community as a source of information and a source of care."

And while these estimates of reluctance are low compared with the rest of the nation, experts have said that at least 70 percent to 85 percent of a population needs to be vaccinated to reach herd immunity. California has fully vaccinated just over one-third of its adults, federal data showed last week.

Given California's low positivity rate, Newsom still has his sights set on June 15 for California's return to "normalcy" in reopening the economy. The state still seems to be keeping the coronavirus's spread under control despite a spring surge looming over the Midwest and other states. But Newsom's target date, announced last month, largely hinged on whether Californians keep up their willingness to get vaccinated.

"People are tired of this, and I understand that," Dr. Timothy Brewer, a professor of infectious disease at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, told Patch last month. "But the virus is still in our community. Hopefully, people will not use their fatigue as an excuse not to get vaccinated or if they are vaccinated, to stop doing those other measures that are so important."

What's more, a "worrisome" trend seen in Los Angeles could possibly disrupt California's progress if the issue spreads across the state: the number of people signing up for a first vaccine dose has dropped significantly, according to the county's Health Director Barbara Ferrer.

"We've seen a significant drop here in L.A. County with people getting vaccinated, and it's very worrisome. Very worrisome," Ferrer said last week. "Almost all of the providers said they had appointments that did not get filled this week."

As of Saturday, the county — which was once considered the state's virus epicenter — recorded 0.6 percent positivity rate, the lowest it has been since the beginning of the pandemic.

The trend of declining appointments has also been observed in Orange County at county-run vaccination centers, but Orange County CEO Frank Kim said it could be because people are turning to pharmacies and private health care providers instead.

"We're starting to see declines in appointments, so we'll start looking at what our phased-down model looks like," Kim said. "But we are not going away. As long as somebody wants a vaccine we'll have a (Point of Distribution) or a mobile clinic."

California Coronavirus Data As Of Sunday

• 3,642,480 confirmed cases to date.

• 2,254 newly recorded confirmed cases Sunday.

• 1.2 percent is the seven-day positivity rate.

• 60,514,937 tests have been conducted in California.

• 60,748 COVID-19 deaths have been reported since the start of the pandemic.

• 30,412,414 vaccine doses have been administered statewide.

The City News Service contributed to this report.