LAX ON THE VAX
Senate GOP quartet have ‘reasons’ for avoiding shot
Some Republican members of Congress have held off on getting vaccinated for COVID-19 despite shots being readily available to them, concerning public health experts who are already worrying about widespread immunization hesitancy among GOP voters across the country.
Right-wing Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Rick Scott of Florida and Mike Braun of Indiana revealed to reporters Tuesday that they have yet to get vaccinated. The conservative quartet — who, like all members of Congress, have had access to the vaccine since December — offered up a variety of explanations for their inoculation reluctance.
“I have chosen not to be vaccinated because I got it naturally and the science of 30 million people and the statistical validity of a 30 million sample is pretty overwhelming that natural immunity exists and works,” said Paul, who caught the virus last March.
Paul, who did not say if he plans to ever get vaccinated, was citing scientifically dubious data about the unlikelihood of contracting COVID-19 more than once.
Despite the Kentucky senator’s claim, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says people should get the vaccine, regardless of whether they’ve ever tested positive for COVID-19, since research has not yet concluded “how long you are protected from getting sick again.” The CDC recommends as many individuals as possible get vaccinated as the U.S. seeks to achieve herd immunity to the virus.
Nonetheless, Johnson offered a similar justification to Paul’s when asked if he has gotten vaccinated.
“No, I had COVID,” the Wisconsin Republican told reporters on Capitol Hill.
Scott was more evasive. “Not yet, I’ve been talking to my doctor,” the Florida Republican said when asked the same question, declining to elaborate.
Braun, meantime, committed to getting the vaccine, but said he recently got cold feet about the Johnson & Johnson shot because he found out it’s produced with “you know, aborted fetus.”
“I’m going to end up probably doing either the Moderna or Pfizer,” he said, referencing the other pharmaceutical giants producing approved coronavirus vaccines.
The vaccine reluctance among GOP senators came on the heels of revelations that 25% of House members haven’t gotten immunized, either. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) made the revelation in a letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) last week, in which he urged her to end proxy voting and other public health precautions in the chamber since, he said, 75% of members are now vaccinated.
McCarthy’s letter, obtained by the Daily News and first reported by NBC News, did not make clear if the nonvaccinated 25% were Republicans or Democrats.
But House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) suggested to reporters Tuesday the holdouts are likely on the GOP side of the aisle. “If you would urge your members to get it and we can assert that all members have taken it, it would facilitate us getting back to some degree of normalcy,” Hoyer said, addressing GOP leaders directly. “We want to get back there as quickly as possible.”
Vaccine dithering among Republicans isn’t isolated to Capitol Hill.
According to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, 42% of Republican voters say they probably or definitely will not get vaccinated for COVID-19. Only 17% of Democrats gave the same answer, according to the poll.
Dr. Dean Winslow, an infectious disease physician at Stanford University Medical Center who treats COVID-19 patients, expressed concern about elected Republicans sending mixed signals about vaccinations, at a time when their supporters are wary of getting the shot. “It makes me a little sad that people who have influence in our society are not supporting getting everyone in the U.S. vaccinated,” said Winslow, who noted that he’s a registered Republican. “COVID-19 is not a partisan disease, and half a million Americans so far have died.”