Trusted voices needed to end pandemic sooner

Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced an increase of 440 new COVID-19 cases in Arkansas Tuesday, two months after the New Year’s Day increase was 4,304. He reported four new deaths, compared to 66 reported Dec. 29.

The trend is going in the right direction. If this continues, the biggest challenge for him and other state officials will be to convince Arkansans to continue to take precautions and to accept the vaccines.

Those vaccines will be a key that locks the door on the pandemic. However, many people have an aversion or outright objection to them, and if the numbers are this low, that will be another reason for them to decline to be vaccinated.

The pandemic will drag on until we reach “herd immunity,” when the virus runs out of hosts to infect. Until then, people might die in numbers that will seem small compared to earlier, but those deaths won’t be small to the victims’ loved ones. Extending the pandemic also will provide more time for new vaccine- resistant strains of the virus to develop.

Hutchinson and his top Health Department officials have been the pandemic’s public faces in Arkansas, but some people won’t listen to them or to national figures such as Dr. Anthony Fauci, no matter what information they provide.

We’re in a period of profound social distrust, when many Americans no longer have faith in public officials and the country’s institutions. So what do you do when people won’t listen to them? You find someone they will listen to.

The Department of Health has started a public education campaign to reach vaccine-hesitant individuals. One ad campaign targeting an African-American audience will feature a health care worker, a teacher and a senior citizen who have been vaccinated. A toolkit has been produced for pastors and other community leaders.

One wellknown person has agreed to participate in the overall effort, though the department is not ready to release that person’s identity.

But more than one are needed. With all due respect to Hutchinson, we should see less of him and more of Razorback football coach Sam Pittman and basketball coach Eric Musselman, whose Hogs shot up this week to number 12 in the Associated Press poll. We need to see likable TV anchor Craig O’Neill, former Arkansas Baptist College President Dr. Fitz Hill (who can get people to run through a brick wall and who gave me permission to use his name), and business leaders with names like “Walton” and “Tyson.”

Speaking of business leaders, they will play a key role. A global survey by the Edelman PR firm found that individuals’ own employers have become trusted sources of information during the pandemic.

Along those lines, a coalition led by Arkansas Blue Cross Blue Shield has created the Vaccinate The Natural State initiative to inspire businesses to encourage their employees to be vaccinated. Employers are asked to take a “Power Over Pandemic Pledge” saying they will strongly encourage their medically able employees to be vaccinated, provide employees the resources they need to make informed decisions, and make it easy for employees to get their shots. Pledge takers say they will set an example by being vaccinated themselves.

Nationwide, one individual in particular could really help increase vaccination rates: former President Trump. His administration’s Operation Warp Speed enabled the vaccines to be developed quickly, and I’m sure he would not mind tooting his own horn about that. He’s already been vaccinated when he was in the White House. If he would help lead a PR campaign to reach his admirers, it could save thousands of lives. He is, after all, a great salesman. President Biden should be willing to – well, you fill in the blank – to encourage Trump to do this.

We have turned the corner on this pandemic, and the end may be in sight. We can stop the sickness, the dying and the sorrow. We can take off the masks, open schools and businesses everywhere, and stop bickering about this disease (though we’ll argue about something else.) We can reach the new normal sooner rather than later.

But it will take longer than it should because we’re in an era when there are few people all of us trust.

That means we’ll need to be informed and encouraged by many people that different groups of us trust. Now.