Transcription:
COVID-19 Misinformation and Vaccine Hesitancy Among African Americans

Scott Webb: Almost as soon as the COVID-19 virus was discovered, misinformation about it began circulating. Misinformation is sometimes connected with real events and experiences, and sometimes it's spread intentionally to deceive people. In either case, it can change people's beliefs and behavior and present a significant public health risk.

Right now, minorities, especially African-Americans, are bearing the largest burden of the pandemic. Blacks are contracting and dying from COVID-19 at rates nearly three times higher than whites and many in African-American communities have a deep distrust of medicine born from centuries of scientific exploitation and experimentation. To help these communities, it's critical that as many people as possible get vaccinated as soon as doses are available. However, to do that, we must overcome many people's mistrust of these vaccines and combat misinformation with roots in generational medical racism.

Welcome to Healthy with VCU Health, where experts from VCU share their knowledge, cutting edge research, and the latest innovations to help you achieve optimal health and wellness. Take control of your health.

I'm Scott Webb and I'm joined today by Dr. Jeanine Guidry. She's a Cancer Prevention and Control researcher at VCU Massey Cancer Center and director of the Media and Health Lab at the Robertson School of Media and Culture.

Doctor, thanks so much for your time today. We know that many African-Americans have a deep distrust of medicine that's born from centuries of scientific exploitation and experimentation. So how did you begin studying this issue?

Dr. Jeanine Guidry: Let me start by saying that I'm not a medical doctor, like most of your guests. I am an assistant professor at VCU's Robertson School of Media and Culture and I joined the Cancer Prevention and Control research program at Massey Cancer after I began collaborating with other Massey researchers to study online misinformation, how it impacts different populations, including people with cancer.

Initially, I had an interest in online, digital, social media communication and started studying the portrayal of different public health issues on these platforms, specifically focused on platforms that include visuals. And much of my research, not all of it, but much of it has focused on vaccine-related misinformation.

So when the COVID-19 pandemic occurred, it was a really natural shift for me to start looking at how misinformation that is presented online impacts different groups for COVID, but also for their willingness to get a COVID-19 vaccine when it becomes available.

Scott Webb: Yeah. And I think you're so right and there has been so much misinformation just from the beginning of the pandemic. Whether it was intentional or not, there just has been. And I guess I'm wondering why is misinformation such a problem, especially during this pandemic?

Dr. Jeanine Guidry: I think there's a number of reasons. Number one, misinformation is inaccurate information that is circulated among the public, a lot of times with the intent to deceive, but also for other reasons. Because people are concerned, they believe that this may be a reason to be concerned. And it's not a new problem, but we have seen it really explode in relation to the COVID pandemic and also to the COVID vaccine.

We have been living with so much uncertainty for over a year now. So many people's lives have been impacted. We haven't had all the answers as far as when can we visit each other again, when can we celebrate holidays again, what's going to happen with our businesses, how is this going to affect my health in general. And that has just been an incredible environment of uncertainty and misinformation thrives in that because we try to find solutions for it.

I think one of the other problems that we have, specifically if you look at something like the COVID-19 vaccine, is in order for the vaccine to work, for us to reach herd immunity, we need to see between 75% and 85% of the population vaccinated. Because of misinformation circulating, we know that anywhere between 40% and 50% of the population may not be ready to get the vaccine, maybe hesitant to get the vaccine. And you can see from those numbers that that's a problem, that doesn't line up.

The other effect of misinformation is something that we just studied. Our team just published a study in emerging infectious diseases, and it showed that parents of kids with cancer, we compared parents of kids with cancer, their answers, to a control group of parents with children with no cancer experience, that parents of children with cancer are more likely to believe misinformation about COVID-19 than parents with healthy children.

And we really didn't expect to find that. We sort of assumed that these parents may be less likely to believe misinformation because they constantly interact with healthcare professionals, they learn about their child's disease. But what we're thinking that may be happening is that there's a combination of stress and time spent seeking health information and then this uncertainty that is added to the uncertainty they already live with that may expose these parents to more misinformation and also may make her more likely to endorse that misinformation. And that's been a real area of concern for populations that are vulnerable in different ways in the midst of this pandemic and the people that may even be even more likely to believe misinformation with the consequences that go with that.

Scott Webb: Yeah. The results of that study are fascinating and sort of unexpected as you say. And yeah, you're so right. You know, the numbers just don't seem to add up, what we need for herd immunity versus how many people are sort of distrustful and unlikely to get the vaccine when it's their turn. We've got to try to line these things up a little bit, and maybe it would help to sort of understand why misinformation is such a risk specifically to minorities.

Dr. Jeanine Guidry: We've now lost more than half a million people to COVID-19 in this country alone. And unfortunately, we also see that the burden of death and disease and morbidity and mortality has been higher in minority communities. Blacks are nearly three times as likely to die from COVID-19 as whites. And it's the result of socioeconomic factors and increased chance of having a comorbidity that may increase their risk of death from the virus. But we can't deny that this is happening.

In addition, we now also see that minorities and particularly blacks and Hispanics may be less likely to be willing to get the vaccine. And they, right now, it looks like, have less access to the vaccine in a practical sense. And then I think there's the issue of trust in the medical community. We don't have time to go through the history of medical racism in the US. But the result of past experimentation, of exploitation, is a deep mistrust of the healthcare system, and that has persisted for generations. And so it has a really deep history, but very real consequences right now in all kinds of different ways.

And I think misinformation, if you add that to that mix, that makes it an even greater risk. We did a study recently. We looked at people's willingness to get a COVID-19 vaccine. When we dug deeper into this, we found as other studies have found that Blacks were significantly less willing to get the vaccination under either FDA label than whites or even Hispanic participants. And from a public health perspective, this is really alarming because this is our most at-risk population and they're the least willing to get vaccinated. And in addition, we also know practically speaking right now, they're not having access to the vaccine. And so we need to understand the reasons that this happens, we need to acknowledge those. We need to regain trust and really be very careful how we communicate about both COVID and the vaccine.

Scott Webb: How do we combat misinformation? How do we help the people who are being misinformed, if you will?

Dr. Jeanine Guidry: One of the things to realize is that we live in an era of so much information and that can become overwhelming, whether that information is correct or incorrect. And our natural response is to somehow make sense of that. We quickly filter information based on our own experiences and prior beliefs, because we can't process it all.

I think the internet has played a significant role in this. But once we share information, especially online, there's no way of taking it back. So I think the first thing is take a pause before we share anything about COVID, especially about ways to prevent it and ways to treat it.

I like to compare it to the idea of washing your hands. We've all heard that one of the things we should do to fight this pandemic, take 20 to 30 seconds and wash your hands, and sing Happy Birthday twice. I like to compare that and say people take 30 seconds, take a step back or take two minutes and process what you're doing. Does this sound too good to be true? Can I find this information elsewhere? Can I confirm it? Is the source reliable? Is it anonymous? Is it tied to a specific interest group? And if you're not sure about that, then maybe it shouldn't be shared until you can confirm if it's a legitimate piece of information that can be confirmed through reliable sources, like the CDC, the World Health Organization, the Virginia Department of Health. I think that is my broadest recommendation. It's the thing we can all do that will have a big impact.

For the healthcare community specifically, I think we need to acknowledge that there are valid reasons for mistrust and we need to work consistently on repairing those relationships. That's not easy. It requires commitment. It's not going to go fast. It's going to require communication, community outreach. And I think Massey's director is modeling this in a really phenomenal way through his Facts & Faith Fridays group. It's a weekly call with African-American faith leaders from across the state to provide reliable information, resources about COVID that they can then share with their congregations.

A lot of times religious leaders, faith leaders are trusted messengers for their communities. And so it is really smart that we partner with those in those communities who are trusted and that we work with them to disseminate accurate information. I think that's a way to do this because repairing these often-broken relationships is not something that necessarily goes quickly. And the pandemic is here. We need to get out of this now, we need to take actions now. So working through other trusted messengers, like faith leaders, is I think a really crucial strategic point.

I think the other thing is we need to communicate accurate information in ways that reach those most vulnerable to the disease and to the misinformation. And that will allow people to fact check things they see online or they hear through word of mouth. And again, sources like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, state health departments, World Health Organization, it's not that they never have to fix anything or adjust anything, but they acknowledge if they have to adjust something or if maybe a mistake has been made, they correct themselves based on scientific evidence.

And finally, I think one of the things to really keep in mind is use empathy. We've all been living in an environment of this deep uncertainty I mentioned earlier. And I think acknowledging that this has been hard. It may not have been the same level of hard for all of us, but it's something that is hard. We've been living through trauma that is associated with COVID-19 and acknowledging that being concerned, that having questions is something natural and that is something we understand. Coming at a level of empathy, not always with just let me correct this misinformation, but acknowledging the human being behind all this and saying, "I understand. This has been hard for all of us."

Final thing I would say is find out what people are concerned about. What are the questions? What are the pieces of misinformation they may be more likely to believe? There's all different ways that we can correct these pieces of misinformation. But we have to answer the question that's there, not all the possible questions that we think may be present.

Scott Webb: Yeah. That's such great advice. Listening to people, demonstrating empathy, all really important messages during this time. Doctor, it's been so great having you on today. As we get close to wrapping up here, why should African-Americans trust these vaccines?

Dr. Jeanine Guidry: Really for the same reason everyone else should. This is sort of protection for themselves, their loved ones, their communities. This is the way out of this pandemic. And I think there are a lot of people who have very reasonable fears of vaccines born from, for example, the speed at which they were developed. This particular vaccine, it's a miracle how fast this was developed. Corners weren't cut in the development. There's other ways that the development was sped up. And I think explaining that is really important.

I think for Black communities, there may be a sense that they would be a guinea pig in just another science experience. That's not the case. The science behind these vaccines, and this is really important, that has been in development for more than a decade. And it has been tested in tens of thousands of people in late-stage clinical trials. We can't leave our most vulnerable communities behind in our vaccination efforts. It's going to make the health disparities that we already deal with so much worse.

And I think making sure people know this vaccine is not just safe, it's effective. The level of efficacy is really remarkable, and this is the way of getting out of this pandemic. This is the way through this pandemic.

Misinformation is often a difficult topic because it's so prevalent and our society has become so fractured and so self-isolated in our own information bubbles. We see the information that we already believe and that confirms the information. And if that's misinformation, that's a real problem.

But communication and trust and open dialogue can be different. It's going to be difficult and we're all tired. Again, this has been a long road. But I do think that as more and more people get vaccinated and share their experiences, people see that their peers, their family members, their friends, their colleagues are getting the vaccine and see the level of relief that often goes with that, I really have a sense of hope. I, for the first time, really see a way through this pandemic.

And misinformation, it disappears in the light of truth. And if we see infection rates dropping, if we see mortality rates drop and we see that is related to the impact of the vaccines, even those considered perhaps "less effective," I really do believe that we're going to see attitudes shift. And if we see attitude shifts, we see behavior shift. We just don't want those benefits to come last to those who need it the most.

Scott Webb: That is very well said. And like you, I'm hopeful as well. It does seem like there is light at the end of the tunnel. And as you say, when exposed to the light, exposed to truth, misinformation will go away. And that was really the message here today. Doctor, thanks so much for your time. You stay well.

Dr. Jeanine Guidry: Thanks so much for having me.

Scott Webb: And thank you for listening to Healthy with VCU Health. To learn more about health disparities research at VCU Massey Cancer Center, visit MasseyCancerCenter.org. That's M-A-S-S-E-Y Cancer Center dot org.