A botched rollout and baseless fears complicate California’s COVID-19 vaccine effort
To listen to this episode of the California Nation podcast, please click on the player above.
My last remaining uncle died of COVID-19 on Saturday. He was one of 492 Californians killed that day by a virus that has now claimed nearly 37,000 lives in the state.
The new COVID vaccine — along with continued mask use and physical distancing — will save many lives. But it will be too late for thousands of people like my uncle. He died in a Los Angeles-area hospital less than two weeks after Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that Californians 65 and older would be eligible for vaccination. State officials now say it could take until June to get most of California’s seniors vaccinated, thanks to the nation’s botched vaccine rollout.
Who’s to blame for the vaccine mess, and what’s the best path forward? In this episode of the California Nation podcast, recorded last Friday, I ask three medical experts.
On one hand, the vaccine’s development is great news. But a lack of sufficient vaccine doses and a disorganized distribution scheme could further delay efforts to get the virus under control.
“We have a shortage of vaccine,” said State Sen. Richard Pan, D-Sacramento.
Pan, a doctor, faulted the federal government for the shortage.
“The vaccine production predictions seem to be out of joint with reality,” he said.
He added that both federal and state officials should have clarified that we don’t currently have enough vaccine doses for everyone.
“I think here in the state, too, we are trying to do things better, as well simplifying the distribution process, being sure we establish better statewide approaches so that we can have more consistent messaging, recognizing that … things don’t stop at county boundaries,” he said.
Even if jabs do become readily available, other challenges await. Vaccine hesitancy caused by misinformation or cultural barriers could also delay efforts to beat the virus.
“There were many things we were surprised to see as the rollout continued, but one of those was vaccine hesitancy in health worker population.” said Dr. Daniel Turner-Llloveras, an assistant professor at UCLA’s Geffen School of Medicine and founder of SaludConTech. “That caught us by surprise. In some areas of L.A. County, the data showed that 20 to 40% of healthcare workers, broadly across different levels, were requesting to wait to receive that first vaccine.”
In addition to anti-vaccine misinformation, Turner-Lloveras said language and cultural barriers can also affect a person’s view of vaccines. Governments must find ways to build trust, he said, especially in communities of color that are most vulnerable to the virus.
“I feel that addressing vaccine hesitancy should be maybe the number one focus of this vaccine rollout,” he said.
Turner-Lloveras has called for the creation of a national task force to address the fear and distrust of vaccines.
Reaching people with factual information informed by cultural differences is crucial to making sure every community is “ready to get the vaccine as soon as it becomes available to them,” said Axana Rodriguez-Torres, a medical student who advocates for communities of color hit hard by the COVID pandemic.
To hear the full conversation with state Sen. Richard Pan, Dr. Daniel Turner-Lloveras and Axana Rodriguez-Torres, click the player at the top of this page.
This story was originally published January 25, 2021 at 5:00 AM with the headline "A botched rollout and baseless fears complicate California’s COVID-19 vaccine effort."