Researchers with the Alabama Community Engagement Alliance (CEAL) Against COVID-19 Disparities, which is part of the National Institutes of Health’s CEAL, recently published findings from a study focused on understanding vaccine hesitancy among African American and Latinx communities.
The publication, “Exploring COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy among Stakeholders in African American and Latinx Communities in the Deep South through the Lens of the Health Belief Model,” was published in the American Journal of Health Promotion and reports findings from focus groups conducted with African American and Latinx participants in Jefferson, Dallas, and Mobile counties in Alabama.
The study concluded that participants were hesitant to receive the COVID-19 vaccine due to mistrust, fear, and lack of information. Participants stated that they preferred to wait and see the long-term effects of the vaccine by watching how others react to it first.
Participants were further concerned about what they felt was the rushed development of the vaccine, unknown long-term side effects, and the efficiency of the vaccine. All of the focus groups mentioned the historical impact of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study as a source of mistrust, and the term “guinea pig” was also used, with several people mentioning they did not want to be part of an experiment.
“We’re listening to what people have to say. Our goal is to increase Alabama’s number of vaccinated residents, and the best way to accomplish this is to hear what the communities are saying and help them form their own opinions based on the facts.”
Mona Fouad, M.D., MPH, Lead Investigator for Alabama CEAL and Director of the Minority Health & Health Disparities Research Center
“We’re listening to what people have to say. Our goal is to increase Alabama’s number of vaccinated residents, and the best way to accomplish this is to hear what the communities are saying and help them form their own opinions based on the facts,” said Mona Fouad, M.D., MPH, Lead Investigator for Alabama CEAL and director of the Minority Health & Health Disparities Research Center.
Informed by these findings, the Alabama CEAL team will continue to provide consistent messages from trusted sources to decrease vaccine hesitancy.
“Addressing concerns – which may be mistrust of a system, fear of getting the coronavirus, and needing more information – falls into an educational model of listening to communities and providing them with truthful, science-based information about strategies to mitigate risk for COVID-19,” said George Mensah, M.D., F.A.C.C., director of the Center for Translation Research and Implementation Science at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and co-Lead of the NIH CEAL initiative.
Authors of the publication include Lori Bateman, Ph.D., R.D.; Allyson G. Hall, Ph.D.; William A. Anderson, Ph.D., MPH, MPA; Andrea L. Cherrington, M.D., MPH; Anna Helova, DrPH, MA, MB; Suzanne Judd, Ph.D.; Robert P. Kimberly, M.D.; Gabriela. Oates, Ph.D.; Tiffany Osborne; Corilyn Ott, Ph.D.; Melissa Ryan, MSHQS; Christian Strong; and Mona N. Fouad, M.D., MPH.
