Perman Hardy said he lost more than ten family members in COVID-19 this year. The virus is suddenly and unexpectedly destroying its rural, black belt community.
“It simply came to our notice then. I continue to die in my family, every month, every week. It’s raining, “he said of the aunts, uncles and cousins who died in Londes County.
Yet Hardy, a retired home health assistant and community organizer for rural sewer and sanitation issues, will look forward to it. Vaccines are on the way. But, on his backyard, his sisters and at-risk friends say they won’t take the shot.
“Yeah, they’re scared, I won’t tell you they’re not scared,” he said, pointing to a lot of uncertainty and inconsistency. “You met high officials talking about this and that. Many people do not have access to a lot of information, and you scare them to death. “
Alabama’s top health experts and community leaders are preparing a distribution effort that they say is unprecedented and presents huge challenges. The stakes are high: end the epidemic and save lives.
“With all the great skills we have, no one has tried to handle this vaccine rollout,” said State Health Officer Fischer Scott Harris.
“There are a lot of moving parts.”
Rural states like Alabama now face unique barriers such as the need for expensive, specialized equipment. On December 10, the first phased Pfizer vaccine needs to be stored in an ultra-cold freezer for FDA approval. Doses will arrive in large quantities that should be used days later, creating a unique challenge that only a few hospitals are equipped to meet.
Those restrictions could be difficult for those who want to be vaccinated in the hardy part of the Black Belt in the coming months.
Lowens County has no hospital and about fifteen percent lack a car.
“If we can’t get a mobile test, (in a black belt) how do we get a vaccine?” She asked.
Preparations for the arrival of the vaccine
This month, 13 health systems in Alabama are ready to vaccinate about 40,950 healthcare workers, using a limited, initial federal allocation of the Pfizer vaccine.
For the first phase of the scheme the number is less than ten per cent for immunization of state healthcare workers.
“We don’t have nearly enough vaccines for people who need them,” Harris said. “Not even close.”
After healthcare workers, priorities are determined by the CDC and ADPH. Next are the residents of the nursing home, the essential workers, the weaker ones due to age or health, and later the general population. Harris expects everyone in Alabama to have access by June.
Molly Stone runs a low-income community health clinic in Montgomery that serves several thousand people in the surrounding counties. She is shopping online for new refrigerators and ultra-cold freezers for volunteer-run clinics, medical outreach ministries.
Nurse Practitioner Hunter Fraser sees a patient on the “back porch” at the Medical Outreach Ministries in Montgomery
“We have to be prepared for anything that comes our way. Who knows what can happen with logistics and transportation and who knows how it can affect weather or cold things. Stone, who eventually decided on a 5 cubic foot ultra-cold freezer for 4,700, would be out of the clinic’s budget.
Instead she hopes to get a smaller amount of Pfizer vaccine that can be stored in dry ice.
Dr. Harris says the Moderna vaccine, which can be refrigerated at higher temperatures and is also for FDA approval, is the state’s best hope of reaching rural areas. By the spring of next year, it is expected that six vaccines will be in delivery, with different restrictions and delivery requirements.
“We are just waiting for ADPH to announce the next steps,” Stone said. We have said, ‘Yes, we want to participate.’
Ryan Kelly, administrator of the Alabama Rural Health Association, says rural health clinics in the Black Belt may be the slowest to get vaccinated.
“Some effectively have a trailer on the side of the road,” he said.
“Especially if the first vaccine causes a side effect of the immune system fighting the virus, especially if the first vaccine fights the virus, especially if it can guarantee that the vaccine will return to the second dose needed a few weeks later,” Kelly said Is.
“It’s challenging for us to carry just the flu vaccine for people,” Stone told patients at her clinic.
“They (science) don’t understand, and so they don’t believe it.”
Scientists say the vaccine is safe.
James Panel, a 25-year-old account manager and p in the Montgomery area. Is. He has a lung in his stepdad and is at greater risk for covid-19, so he prefers the idea of a vaccine, but months later does not understand how it was made.
“I personally waited 4 years before I could get a vaccine myself.” “What are the side effects five years from today?”
The James panel wants to wait and see about the vaccine
The long-term effects of the vaccine are unknown as it was just developed, although experts say it is far safer.
U.A.B. And Dr. Alabama Children’s Hospital pediatric infectious disease specialist. “Yes, the process has been expedited,” said David Kimberlyn. “That’s a really good thing.”
“This is a very large study, involving thousands of people. Other vaccines are tested in the same way. “
Due to the urgency of the epidemic, many people were studying together for vaccine trials using similar methods, usually on a small, slow basis.
Dr. Harris says if the FDA approves the vaccines, it means they are safe and effective.
“I can say with confidence that if there is a problem with the vaccine they will not sign it.”
He said the vaccines were funded by the federal government which allowed companies like Moderna to start production while usually awaiting trial results without facing the rollout of new vaccines without facing economic risks. He said this federal support accelerated the delivery timeline.
“The reason this process is happening so fast is that these vaccine manufacturers are doing a lot of things in parallel at the same time that they would normally do one at a time.”
The Pfizer and Modernna vaccines rely on a new approach that has been used for years for mRNA or messenger RNA. Develops using proteins, which ask the body to build immunity to COVID-19 without the use of live viruses.
Healthcare workers will be the first group of Americans to decide whether to be vaccinated. But even in that group, CDC data showed only 63 percent said they were ready to be vaccinated. According to USA Health in Mobile, a partial poll of hospital staff found that only half would receive a single vaccine.
Scientists are still determining when re-vaccination will be needed or whether a person can be infected with the virus after being vaccinated and it is not known how long the vaccine will last.
As scientists answer key questions about vaccination, it will be just as important to reassure people with an integrated communication campaign, said Jim Carnes, policy director for advocacy group Alabamaisis.
“This vaccine meets all the strict standards and requirements and delivering this vaccine to the public is a legitimate public health service that can help keep everyone safe,” we have a lot of ground to help people understand. He said.
“On top of that, we have this new political brand of distrust that has spread across the country since the virus appeared. ”
Dr. Harris wore a mask to mourn the politicization of vaccination.
“People are taking these partisan positions on what medical decision should be made,” he said.
The panel, a suspect, says their Facebook feed is full of conspiracy theories posted by friends that the vaccine is planted tracking from the government. “They’re just scared, and they think the government is out to get them.”
“We’ve never been here before. You have to wear a mask wherever you go. People are dying left and right. News reports thousands and thousands of deaths every day from Kovid, and no one understands what Kovid is. The panel said.
ADPH’s outreach plan includes hiring consultants to create messages for public education and communication about vaccine safety.
“I plan to take it. I would recommend it to my parents and my family would recommend it, “said Dr. Harris said many Alabami people may need the same message from local leaders and people they know.
He hopes that if Alabama can reach 30 to 40 percent compliance with the state’s success rate with the flu vaccine, it will be enough to stop the spread of COVID-19.
“If there’s no yield, we’ve really done nothing,” Harris said. “Vaccines have never saved anyone’s life, just vaccinations.” ”
“Everyday Tuskigi”
Dr. Mona Fouad of UAB, Director of UAB’s Minority Health and Health Content Research Center, is helping focus groups with minority populations around the state to help local communities develop messaging around the vaccine.
“I am very optimistic that we can overcome all obstacles and vaccinate people at risk,” he said.
Although Alabama has no plans to employ mobile units to travel to remote areas of the state for vaccine distribution, Fouad says UAB is ready to do that, as it is doing through mobile testing.
UAB staff members provide mobile coronavirus testing in the low-income Birmingham neighborhood
In preparation, she is talking to Black Alabamins about their distrust of the medical system. She is called “everyday Tuskigi”, when people of color feel that when they feel that their doctor is not filling them or showing them little respect.
“I think Tuscany has always been in people’s minds,” he said of the infamous 1950 study in which medical researchers deliberately failed to treat African Americans infected with syphilis.
The underlying fear is that the information is withholding, and people think, “You’re not telling me exactly what to say,” Foude said.
For Fouad, the solution is to inform people in minority communities about their own conclusions about the vaccine.
Birmingham radio personality Chris Coleman is trying to do the same. He has type II diabetes and is expected to get the vaccine relatively soon. When he does, he wants to live, on social media, to show his audience not to be intimidated.
He believes that if Dr. Fausi and past presidents are vaccinated, that’s fine.
“Black people (since then) haven’t believed in anything (government) and it happened in the 1990s,” he said of Tuscany history.
“It’s like the boyfriend you’re talking to over and over again. Do you trust him? This is how they feel. “
Londes County organizers are looking at the last major hurdle in controlling the epidemic towards the harsh winter months. She believes she has the kind of influence in her family and local community that will drown people for the vaccine.
“I’ve been out of a lot of things and they know I do,” he said. “When it comes to relieving pressure, once I get my vaccine, oh, it will come in line. They all need it. I know I need it, and they need it. “
