Nothing will change Ron Holloway’s mind when it comes to the Covid-19 vaccine: he won’t get it.
“I just feel like God created us, made our bodies so wonderful that we can almost get immunized,” Holloway, 75, told The Guardian. “We are ready to do that in most cases. I just don’t see the need. ”
Holloway is among millions of men who identify Republicans who say they do not intend to receive the coronavirus vaccine. According to a recent NPR / PBS NewsHour / Marist poll, 49% of Republican men told polls they would not receive the jab; the survey is among the recent analyzes that claim that the hesitation of the vaccine is the highest in this demographic.
These data have raised alarm for disease experts, who have struggled to combat Covid-19 amid strong politicization of public health policies, such as Republican opposition often masking mandates and trade regulations and the frequent claim of theories. conspiracy.
“How such a large proportion of a certain group of people would not want to be vaccinated just for political reasons … it makes absolutely no sense,” said recently the American expert Anthony Bouci, a leader in infectious diseases. “What is the problem here?” This is a vaccine that will save lives for millions of people. ”
While some powerful Republicans have asked people to receive the vaccine, mixed messaging persists among conservatives. Fox News host Tucker Carlson recently criticized the Biden administration’s efforts to expand the vaccine, saying: “If you want to get the vaccine, don’t repress it, don’t issue more orders, calm your fears by rationally explaining the benefits and risks of the vaccine. ”
The Beaumont Foundation, an organization that aims to improve public health, organized a focus group on March 13 to understand the vaccine opposition among Republicans. The group consisted of 19 members, men and women, who identified themselves as Republicans. The selected participants “answered ‘maybe’ or ‘probably not’ when asked if they would receive a Covid vaccine.”
Group leader Frank Luntz, a veteran Republican poller, asked participants: “When I say Covid-19 vaccination, the vaccine … what do you think first?” One man replied, “A miracle, though suspicious.” One man said he was “in a hurry,” while another said “experimental.” A man said, “Don’t hold my freedom hostage.”
Alec Tyson, associate director of research at the Pew Research Center, said there was a “similar dynamic” between the partisan gap in beliefs about the threat to public health of Covid-19 and attitudes toward vaccinations. “Republicans have been much less concerned than Democrats” about the Covid-19 risk to public health, Tyson said. “The intention to vaccinate is one of the main correlations with this attitude.”
While researching the vaccine’s intent, Tyson said Pew researchers asked those who did not intend to receive the vaccine why.
Among those who did not intend to receive the vaccine, Tyson said Republicans in the group “are more likely to tell us they don’t think they need it than Democrats don’t intend to get it.”
Panayiota Kendeou, professor of educational psychology and Guy Bond reading department at the University of Minnesota, said that while some hesitation about the vaccine was “predictable,” some were also unique to the type of political climate, the way it was treated the pandemic in the US and around the world and the policy that clouded the waters a little in terms of decision-making and the consequences of our decisions.
Kendeou explained that the hesitation of the vaccine has traditionally been favored by a number of known factors and said that “the main one is the perceived risk of infection”. Perceived side effects are also essential when people weigh whether vaccines are given.
“Regarding the content of the Covid-19 vaccine, those who perceived health risks in terms of the actual disease of the disease and also, having fears about the side effects of the vaccine, gained political guidance,” said Kendeou. “So we have seen, for example in the United States, that some groups are more or less afraid of the Covid-19 virus and question the severity of the pandemic. Of course, this has translated into the type of vaccine hesitation breakdown we see reported. ”
Loren Anthony Williams – a self-described “moderate conservative” who says “I’m by no means a fervent and tough Trumpeter”, replied “probably not” when asked if he would receive the Covid-19 vaccine.
Williams, who works in the medical marijuana industry, said he’s not an “anti-vaxxer or anything,” but remains skeptical, saying the jab was “rushed with a healthy dose of politics involved because Trump was trying to “Take him out there in November before the election.”
Asked later about politicization, Williams explained, “I think he was very politicized by Trump. Calling it Operation Warp Speed, doing everything possible to get it out before the election. “While Trump” considered the welfare of the country, “Williams said, he also had political goals. Williams said his personal political beliefs did not play a role in his skepticism about the vaccine.
The 35-year-old Detroit resident also said, “I don’t need him, because I’m a pretty healthy person, and if I got the coronavirus, I’d be fine without the vaccine. I would overcome it alone.
“For the elderly or at risk, I would not discourage them from receiving the vaccine. This is their choice. It would probably benefit them a lot more, because they are at a higher risk, ”Williams continued, saying that his elderly parents had already received the vaccine.
Asked if anything could influence his opinion, Williams said “maybe.”
“Because I’m not a chemist or a biologist, maybe if I knew how it was made and was in it, I could change my mind.”
However, some Republicans are skeptical about vaccine hesitation statistics among men in the party. Andrew Bilardello, who runs a Republican club in The Villages, a large community of retirees in Florida, told The Guardian, “Most people here are registered Republicans and most people here get the vaccine.”
Bilardello, a retired police chief, pointed out that Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis visited the area last week and promoted the Johnson & Johnson one-shot vaccine and recently announced a decrease in vaccination age eligibility. Bilardello, 63, said he would receive Johnson & Johnson’s jab.
“I drive past the vaccination sites and I have to tell you: every day I pass, there are lines of people to receive the vaccine,” Bilardello said. Everyone cares, everyone wears masks … For most people here in the villages, I take the pandemic here very seriously. ”
Joe Martin, a Republican from Georgia, said he did not see the vaccine falter among his colleagues. He said people who did not receive it had access problems, but did not hesitate.
“Everyone I know, we all go out to dinner because we had the chance,” said Martin, 77. “Once you get the chance, you are free to socialize and do all sorts of things. Why wouldn’t you want to? ”
Despite reported levels of hesitation or increased resistance to the vaccine, there is evidence that minds may change.
Dr. Tom Frieden, former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, gave five facts about Covid-19 to participants in Beaumont’s virtual focus group. Among the facts: more than 90% of the doctors who were offered the vaccine decided to receive it. When the focus group ended, 16 said they were more willing to receive the vaccine, the organization said.