Vice President Harris In Atlanta Urges Vaccine-Shy Georgians: ‘Get Those Numbers Up'

By Ross Williams, Georgia Recorder

June 18, 2021

Vice President Kamala Harris visited Atlanta Friday in an effort to bump up the state’s lagging COVID-19 vaccination numbers ahead of President Joe Biden’s goal to at least partially vaccinate 70% of the nation’s adults by Independence Day.

Georgia is not doing Biden any favors this time — about 52% of Georgians 18 or older have received at least one dose, but that number is just over 65% for the nation, according to from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Demand is so low in some areas that the state has millions of doses to the federal government, to be redistributed to states that want them.

“We got to get those numbers up,” Harris said. “We can do better. And we have to address, in so doing, the legitimate barriers that stand in the way of some folks getting the vaccine. Because we’ve got to be clear-eyed and speak truth, OK? And so, this is where you come in, which is to help us address those issues.”

Harris spoke to a crowd of about 300 at Clark Atlanta University, calling on the people there to convince their friends and relations to get the shot.

“Let’s arm ourselves with the truth so we can arm them with the truth — these vaccines were developed over a decade by scientists like Dr. (Kizzmekia) “Kizzy” Corbett, a nationally recognized scientist, who also happens to be a Black woman,” she said, drawing cheers and applause from the friendly crowd.

“So when people say, ‘Oh, it seems like this vaccine just came about overnight,’ no, it didn’t,” she said. “It actually is the result of many, many, many years of research. And then they also went through what we call the FDA clinical trials so that they would be ensured to be safe, where they were tested on a whole lot of people.”

Harris gave the crowd ideas on what to say if the people they are trying to convince say they don’t have enough time to get the vaccine — “pharmacies across our country are keeping their doors open for 24 hours on Fridays in June, including today.” If they can’t afford a babysitter — “we have partnered with the YMCA, with KinderCare, and the Learning Care Group to provide free child care for both vaccination and recovery.” Or if they don’t have a ride — “now, as part of the solution, rideshare companies are giving free rides to and from vaccination centers.”

Gaps

It’s no surprise that Harris chose to visit Clark, one of Atlanta’s historically Black colleges and universities, for her Georgia trip. There’s a racial gap in vaccination in Georgia, tracking the national trend.

Black Georgians make up 32% of the population and account for 35% of COVID-19 deaths, but they have only received 25% of the shots in the state, according to data from the .

White Georgians make up 58% of the population, account for 58% of the deaths, and they have received 57% of the vaccinations.

But there is also a political gap in the vaccine rate. In a , only 58% of Republicans said they had been or were planning to be vaccinated, compared with 89% of Democrats. Another 29% of Republicans said they will not get vaccinated, and 13% say they’re still making up their minds. Among Democrats, only 5% said they will definitely not get the vaccine, and 6% say they’re still deciding.

A map on the state Department of Public Health’s website shows the two-Georgia geographic divide — metro Atlanta and counties surrounding other major cities are dark blue, signifying that those counties are approaching 50% vaccination rates, but there is a sea of baby blue in the southeast and northwest parts of the county, which are largely white and conservative, where vaccination rates are below 20%.

‘Trust is the key’

Skepticism of politicians and powerful institutions unites the vaccine hesitant in both the Black and conservative communities, said Dr. Isaac Chun-Hai Fung, associate professor of epidemiology at the Jiann-Ping Hsu College of Public Health at Georgia Southern University.

“I think trust is the key, and the reasons for mistrust can be many, and very diverse,” he said.

Some Black Georgians are wary of what they see as a new and untested pharmaceutical because of past and current medical racism, the most infamous example of which were the Tuskegee experiments, in which hundreds of Black men were allowed to suffer from syphilis without their knowledge for decades so scientists could track the progress of the disease, Fung said.

Others, both white and Black, have been bombarded by falsehoods about the vaccine through social media, he added.

“There has been misinformation, for example, about the vaccine causing infertility,” he said. “So I think there is some overlap in terms of the hesitance toward the medical establishment. Pieces of the vaccine hesitancy might be shared by members of the African-American and white evangelical communities.”

That mistrust combined with structural issues helps explain the lack of vaccine buy-in in Georgia and other Southern states, said Georgia State University public health professor Dr. Harry J. Heiman.

“Southern, more conservative states have also historically underinvested in public health infrastructure, so the same failure of public health infrastructure that left us unprotected and unprepared at the onset of the pandemic, has been a real challenge, not only in terms of testing early on, but in terms of vaccine rollout, and the kinds of public health infrastructure and manpower that you need, particularly at the local level, to build trusted relationships with communities to support that kind of rollout,” he said.

At stake is more than just a return to mask-free life, said Dr. Lilly Immergluck, a professor at Morehouse School of Medicine and principal investigator for the school’s participation in the U.S. COVID-19 Prevention Network, which includes COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials.

Scientists worry unvaccinated people could become petri dishes for new and potentially more dangerous viruses. Georgia has recorded cases of variant viruses which may be more transmissible and cause more serious symptoms.

“These mutations that happen are, like anything, it’s survival of the fittest, so it’s mutating the way that allows it to survive the best,” she said. “Decreasing the overall virus running around so we as humans are not the host to allow that multiplication to occur is the way to drive this down.”

To convince a vaccine skeptic, sometimes the message itself is less important than who delivers it, Immergluck said.

Community and religious leaders often do a better job convincing the wary than scientists and doctors.

Leaders including former UN Ambassador Andrew Young and the late baseball legend Hank Aaron publicly got their shots at Morehouse in an effort to show that the shot is safe. The school is also using established relationships in local neighborhoods to spread the word about the importance of vaccines, but the Morehouse name itself was enough to get some in Atlanta’s African American community to sign up for clinical trials at the college, she said.

“They’re overcoming some of their fears about it because they see Morehouse School of Medicine, a (Historically Black College and University) medical school as a trusted source for them,” Immergluck said.

Boosting Georgia’s vaccination rate will require duplicating those kinds of efforts around the state, working with local churches and community groups outside the big cities, Heiman said.

“I think we really need to hear from some of our conservative leaders in the state and across the country and look to them to do outreach to their supporters and people that listen to them as reliable source, to convince those populations because you’ve got the critical need for them to get vaccinated as well,” he said.

The day before Harris’ visit, Gov. Brain Kemp announced a plan to get more Georgians vaccinated through more than 370 community vaccination events before July 4.

The Georgia Recorder, an independent, nonprofit news organization, connects public policies to stories of the people and communities affected by them through a steady mix of in-depth reporting, blog posts, and social media updates on the latest news and progressive commentary. The Recorder is part of States Newsroom, a national 501(c)(3) nonprofit supported by grants and a coalition of donors and readers.