Americans need straight talk on virus vaccine
Educating public should be a priority, they say
More than a dozen experts tell USA TODAY the government must ramp up its messaging about how the vaccine will work, and what it will do to you.
The U.S. government has spent more than $10 billion creating vaccines to protect against COVID-19 but so far little encouraging Americans to take them.
Public health officials say that’s a mistake.
“This needed to happen yesterday. It’s like watching a train wreck happen,” said Daniel Salmon, director of the Institute for Vaccine Safety at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Now, even before any vaccines are approved, is the time to start telling America straight-up what to expect, more than a dozen public health and medical experts told USA TODAY.
That includes warning that a COVID-19 vaccine likely won’t be 100% effective, getting it will make a substantial number of people “feel like crud” for a day or two, and two shots will be required, not just one.
And they question if the best messenger is a brand-new entity called Operation Warp Speed.
Part of the concern is the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been sidelined by the Trump administration when it comes to communicating with and educating the public about the importance of receiving a coronavirus vaccine. That crucial work is being spearheaded by Operation Warp Speed, a Trump-administration-created and -appointed task force, and the Department of Health and Human Services. That puzzles public health experts. “The CDC should be leading the charge and coordinating, as they always have in the past,” said Anne Rimoin, a professor of epidemiology at the University of California-Los Angeles School of Public Health.
During COVID-19, the CDC has been diminished by the White House, which makes its ability to get clear messages out more difficult.
Thus far the largest Health and Human Services expenditure on communication has been a $40 million Office of Minority Health partnership initiative with Morehouse School of Medicine to deliver education and information on resources to help fight the pandemic, including vaccines, in racial and ethnic minority and vulnerable communities.
According to an HHS spokesperson, various agencies and offices at the Department of Health and Human Services are working with Operation Warp Speed and other groups on a robust public health information campaign that focuses on vaccine safety, efficacy and hesitancy. Specifics, however were not provided.
Experts ticked off specific actions health officials should be taking now, well ahead of when an actual COVID-19 vaccine is authorized. Top among them: public briefings.
There has been confused and intermittent communication to the public about the pandemic and what it will take to end it. Daily briefings should immediately start, led by the same person every day, so the public has a face they can get to know and trust, experts say.
“This is textbook crisis communications. Pull out the rulebook and follow it,” said Dr. Kelly Moore, associate director of immunization education at the Immunization Action Coalition, a national vaccine education and advocacy nonprofit.
Public health leaders should go into excruciating detail about how vaccines are developed, how they are tested for safety and efficacy and how the review process works, said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
The information needs to be repeated so often the public could almost give the briefings themselves, Moore said. “There should be documentaries on television about this stuff.”
One of the first things many of the experts interviewed suggested was backing off the name Operation Warp Speed because it sends the wrong message.
“Just choosing the name Operation Warp Speed has set people’s teeth on edge,” Schaffner said. While it was named with all good intentions to communicate hard work and speed, “what people heard was ‘They’re cutting corners,’ ” he said.
It’s a bad name for what is actually a good process, said Marla Dalton, CEO of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases. “What we’re doing is compressing the timeline; we’re not skipping steps. Unfortunately, Operation Compressed Timeline isn’t as catchy.”
Also, expectations need to be managed, experts say. The public needs to remember the vaccine will not be immediately available and even when it is it will take months, if not a year, to immunize the entire nation.
A vaccine is not an magic bullet, said Monica Schoch-Spana, a senior scholar with the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. It may not be equally effective for all ages and some people can’t, or won’t, get vaccinated.
“Just because a vaccine shows up doesn’t mean we can throw our masks away and stop washing our hands and social distancing,” she said. There’s a tremendous amount of work that must happen before that day comes. “It was a mistake by the (Trump) administration to suggest that a vaccine was going to be a be-all and end-all.”
In addition, people should know that the trials indicate this is not a painless vaccine. “This is a nasty vaccine to get,” said Dr. William Schaffner, a vaccine expert and professor of infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University. “It really makes your arm sore. It can make you feel crummy for 24 hours. And remember, it’s a two-dose vaccine. Well, guess what – the second dose is worse than the first.”
Honesty about potential side effects from a vaccine also is important.
The truth doesn’t need to be sugarcoated, said Maya Goldenberg, a professor at the University of Guelph in Canada and author of the forthcoming book, “Vaccine Hesitancy: Public Trust, Expertise, and the War on Science.”
“It turns out the public can handle uncertainty,” she said. “We can manage ambiguity.”