State was wise not to dangle millions to push vaccination
I told you so.
This spring, I lamented how some states were bribing people to get their COVID-19 shots. I said vaccine lotteries, such as Ohio’s that gave away $5 million, were a disgusting waste of public money.
A new study confirms that.
Research published Friday in the online JAMA Health Forum concluded that lottery and prize programs in 19 states had no measurable impact. The analysis compared vaccination rates in those states to states without lotteries.
“No statistically significant association was detected between a cash-drawing announcement and the number of vaccinations before or after the announcement date,” the study concluded.
Thankfully, Pennsylvania officials refrained from such foolishness.
As other states rushed to create lotteries and other incentive programs, Gov. Tom Wolf ’s administration refused. Officials said they were confident people would get vaccinated because it was the right thing to do.
In May, Wolf tried to encourage people to get their shots by saying the state’s mask mandate would end when 70% of adults were fully vaccinated.
The call for Pennsylvanians to do their civic duty, unfortunately, had limited impact. Wolf later backed off and lifted the mask mandate in late June.
Pennsylvania didn’t hit the 70% adult vaccination mark until last week — after public and private sector vaccination mandates were issued, and the fast-spreading delta variant scared
others to get their shots.
Philadelphia tried a sweepstakes, with cash prizes totaling about $400,000. It didn’t work so well, either, according to a study by the University of Pennsylvania. It did not lead to a statistically significant change in the number of people getting vaccinated, WHYY reported.
The research published in JAMA Health Forum, a peer-reviewed journal, analyzed lotteries in Arkansas, Colorado, California, Delaware, Illinois,
Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Washington and West Virginia.
It concluded that lottery-style sweepstakes may be less effective than programs that guaranteed an award for being vaccinated. It also said it’s possible that prize drawings just weren’t an effective promotional strategy and “more complete messaging on vaccination” might have worked better.
“I have no doubt that all of the governors’ offices that were doing these lotteries had good intentions,” said one of the authors, Andrew Friedson, an associate economics professor at University of Colorado Denver, in an interview with Colorado Newsline.
“I’m sure it’s disappointing. But if we have a policy goal that we’re trying to achieve — which is to get people vaccinated — we have to be a little bit agnostic about how we get there.
“If a policy works, we want to do more of that. If it doesn’t work, we want to move away. So we tried the policy, it didn’t work, and now it’s time to move on.”
“Vaccine misinformation” was another reason that researchers cited for why some people won’t get vaccinated.
While the carrot didn’t increase vaccination rates, the stick has worked.
When COVID-19 surged again this summer, vaccination rates rose at least partly because of vaccine mandates.
Colleges, nursing homes and hospitals in the Lehigh Valley were among the places that required vaccines.
Some states, including Pennsylvania, required some workers to get their shots, too. Wolf mandated them — or regular testing — for staff in state prisons and state-run veterans homes, community health centers and facilities for people with intellectual disabilities.
A state appeals court recently dismissed a lawsuit by the corrections officers union that challenged the policy.
I initially opposed vaccine mandates, but changed my position as the pandemic continued despite the presence of vaccines. If employers — including governments — believe their staff should be vaccinated or regularly tested, they should require it.
Governments should not be imposing mandates on businesses or individuals, though, as President Joe Biden is.
I’m not convinced his plan will boost the vaccination rate as much as he believes.
If people weren’t willing to roll up their sleeve for a shot at $1 million, the weekly prize in Ohio’s lottery, are they really going to do it because the government ordered them to?