Those hesitant about shots not apt to change

Stop talking about the possibility of coronavirus booster shots. Don’t bully people who are vaccine holdouts. And if you’re trying to win over skeptics, show us anyone besides Anthony Fauci.

That’s what a focus group of vaccine-hesitant Trump voters urged politicians and pollsters over the weekend, as public health officials work to understand potential roadblocks in the campaign to inoculate Americans against the coronavirus.

Among the most pressing questions are why so many GOP voters remain opposed to the shots and whether the recent decision to pause Johnson & Johnson vaccinations was a factor.

Although more than half of U.S. adults have received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine, more than 40 percent of Republicans consistently have told pollsters they’re not planning to be vaccinated — a group large enough to threaten efforts to tamp down the virus’ spread, public health officials fear.

Many vaccine-hesitant Americans increasingly are entrenched in their decisions to resist the shots, said Frank Luntz, a longtime GOP communications expert who convened Sunday’s focus group over Zoom.

“The further we go into the vaccination process, the more passionate the hesitancy is,” Luntz said after the session. “If you’ve refused to take the vaccine this long, it’s going to be hard to switch you.”

That was the case in the weekend’s focus group, the latest in a series Luntz has convened. It included 17 participants who heard pro-vaccine pitches from four doctors, including three Republican politicians and Tom Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the Obama administration.

Unlike a similar focus group five weeks ago, when most participants told Luntz and Frieden that the session persuaded them to get shots, attendees Sunday said they were swayed only moderately by doctors’ urging — or not moved at all.

“I was zero (on) the vaccine. I’m still a zero,” a woman identified as Tammy from Virginia said about an hour into Sunday’s focus group.

Her comments came after Frieden repeatedly tried to calm attendees’ fears, which included questions about the vaccines’ unknown longterm effects and about bizarre conspiracy theories suggesting the shots would change recipients’ DNA.

While cautioning against drawing too many conclusions from a single focus group, public health experts said the nearly two-hour session offered insight on messages that could reach holdout Americans — and which messages didn’t.

For instance, the group largely shrugged off federal regulators’ decision last week to pause Johnson & Johnson’s coronavirus vaccine for safety reviews, citing the risk of rare blood clots. Luntz and others had expected the pause to worsen hesitancy, but focus group participants instead asked why doctors were halting a potentially useful medical treatment, given that the reported side effects were so rare.

“A lot of people might want to take the Johnson & Johnson vaccine vs. the others, because it’s one shot vs. two,” said a woman identified as Cathy from Pennsylvania.

Brian Castrucci, an epidemiologist who leads the de Beaumont Foundation, which helped convene the focus group, said: “Every public health person, me included, thought this would be a real hit to vaccine confidence. But we didn’t see folks really concerned with the pause in the J & J vaccine.”

The foundation, which focuses on community public health, also issued a poll Tuesday with Luntz that found that most Americans thought the Johnson & Johnson pause shows that safety protocols are working. A federal advisory committee this week is expected to determine whether medical officials can resume administering the vaccine.

Instead, the focus group participants said they were far more concerned by recent news that they may need ongoing shots to ward off the coronavirus. Pfizer chief executive Albert Bourla told CNBC this month that Americans who received his company’s two-dose vaccine regimen probably will need a third shot within a year.

“I feel like this is not going to end. I mean, we’re just going to be shot up and shot up and shot up,” said a man identified as Erzen from New York. “We can’t live like this. This is not sustainable.”

“I was zero (on) the vaccine. I’m still a zero.”

A woman identified only as Tammy from Virginia, at a focus group of Republican vaccine skeptics