‘ I can’t even get my own mother to take it’
Bridgeport works to overcome minorities’ distrust of vaccine, local leaders say
BRIDGEPORT — Resident Margie Oden happily received her first dose of the coronavirus vaccine in late January so that she could soon venture out in public again.
“It’s not easy ( being) in the house all the time,” Oden, 77, who is scheduled to get her second required shot in a couple of weeks, said. “There’s no church service. No meetings. No going out. So I’m very eager.”
As was Town Clerk Lydia Martinez, who was vaccinated for the first time this week.
“I have been able to keep myself away as much as I can from crowds. But it was getting a little bit too much for me to be hiding, staying home, or being in my office, alone,” Martinez said. “It ( the shot) was not a lot of pain. It was easy.”
In contrast, East End activist Deborah Sims, even as she works to ensure that neighborhood has good access to the vaccines, admitted she needs to learn more herself before receiving them.
“I need to make sure. You know, you hear all the myths and the ‘ old folks’ tales about all that kind of stuff,” Sims said.
She and Oden are African American, and Martinez is Hispanic. And they represent the divide that several leaders in those Bridgeport communities told Hearst Connecticut Media exists about taking the brand new medicines needed to combat the deadly global pandemic that has hit people of color in particular hard.
That skepticism is just another complication for Connecticut’s cities, where health officials face challenges distributing the vaccines and, because of the digital divide, also need to assist residents who do not have computer or Internet access with scheduling their appointments online.
“Our community has had such a history when it comes to new things,” Sims said. “They always bring up the Tuskegee study.” Tuskegee, Alabama, is where, from the early 1930s to the early 1970s, the federal government used unsuspecting African American men to study syphilis, a sexually transmitted disease.
“So a lot of Black people don’t forget that,” said East End City Councilman Ernie Newton.
“I can’t even get my own mother to take it,” said Stanley Lord, president of the Greater Bridgeport NAACP. “She’s from that era of the Tuskegee issue.” He said he has also heard from other Black people worried “they’re not going to give us the right one.”
Last week the NAACP teamed up with Bridgeport Hospital on an online town hall called “COVID- 19 Vaccine: The Facts vs. Fiction.”
State Rep. Christopher Rosario, D- Bridgeport, recalled how Puerto Rican women were test subjects in the mid- 1950s for oral contraception.
“Many were guinea pigs,” Rosario said.
“Here comes this vaccine that was developed fairly quickly,” Rosario continued. “I’m not disputing the effectiveness of it. But there is a concern with people in our community that we’re being test subjects.”
“I think it’s inherent in minority communities who’ve been subjugated to these type of experiments and ‘ let’s test this out,’” said City Council President Aidee Nieves of the level of suspicion. She said two elderly family members have similarly been reluctant to receive their vaccine doses.
While City Hall and Bridgeport’s medical institutions have been working hard to disseminate information about the coronavirus medicines, Nieves is calling for “a robust campaign” to build trust among Black and Hispanic residents: “Getting people in the community that are known who have received their vaccines ( and) having them be the spokesperson.”
Lord said he would gladly publicize his shot when he receives it. Newton as well.
Rosario likened the effort to how
he and others in positions of authority tried to reassure constituents that it was okay to participate in the federal government’s 2020 census count. “You need trusted people to go into neighborhood and say, ‘ This is safe to do,’” he said. “If you see people that you know that took it, you’re more apt to do it.”
That was one motivation for Rev. Dr. Simon Castillo of Good Shepherd Christian Church, who recovered from coronavirus, when he sought his first shot this week. Castillo said he has heard from many Hispanic and Black residents who worry about potential side effects.
Castillo, 81, said he went on the chance it could prevent him from getting the virus again. “The other thing is to help the people,” he said. “Yes, they can decide to go and take the vaccine without any problem.”
Castillo noted, however, the responsibility that comes with acting as a promoter and recommended the general public seek advice from their physicians if they have reservations. “Somebody has some side effect ... and then they make you responsible,” he said. “They say, ‘ Oh, the pastor said and I did it and this happened to me.’”
Two Black pastors, William McCullough, head of the Interdenominational Ministerial alliance of Greater Bridgeport, and Warren Godbolt of Enterchange Ministries, want faith leaders and houses of worship to play a greater role in encouraging vaccinations.
“We got our finger on the pulse of the people,” McCullough said. “We don’t tell them what to do, but they listen to us and follow us. We set a tone and a trend.”
Godbolt is trying to organize a group of pastors to receive their shots in front of the media and would also like religious institutions to be able to host medical providers issuing the doses.
And for those followers who are suspicious of the science, Godbolt encourages them to look to their faith.
“If you are Christian and you believe in Christ — if you just believe, period — you have an obligation not to hurt anybody,” he said. “So that means if you catch COVID and you infect different people and one died, whose fault is that? What God sees is to see it as your fault, because he has prepared people in science to come up with a vaccine.”
He concluded: “I understand the system of things that happened with African American and brown people. ... Our history of being guinea pigs. ... At the same time, people are dying ( of coronavirus) and we have to be responsible.”