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Why we re thinking about vaccine hesitancy wrong in communities of color: Experts
On Location: May 7, 2021
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It started with the op-eds. Even before COVID-19vaccines were widely available, newspapers opinion pages warned that some Black people would be hesitant to get the shot. Those columns often referenced the infamous 1930s Tuskegee Syphilis Study, during which doctors withheld treatment from Black men with syphilis, as evidence of lingering well-founded mistrust that might drag down vaccination rates in the Black community.MORE: The risks unvaccinated Americans are weighing
That theory wasn t just fueled by newspapers. Former President Barack Obama and former NBA player Charles Barkley both referenced Tuskegee during an April NBC special to encourage Black Americans to get vaccinated. I’m telling all my friends, Yo man, forget what happened back in the day, every Black person, please go out and get vaccinated, Barkley said.
The risks unvaccinated Americans are weighing
Vaccine demand drops
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Joshua Smith, an 18-year-old former high school baseball player who beat the coronavirus back in May, doesn t particularly fear it, but he does fear side effects from the vaccine and he doesn t trust most sources that tell him otherwise.
What he does trust is what he sees around him, which is why Smith s decision not to get a vaccine isn t set in stone. I won t say that I won t, he told ABC News. But he wants to see firsthand that the vaccine is really helping and people had good reviews on it.