Gov. Gavin Newsom routinely boasts that California has “one of the highest vaccination rates in the United States of America.” But Newsom, facing a recall election this fall, seldom mentions that the state’s covid vaccine uptake has largely stagnated in Black and Latino neighborhoods hardest hit by the coronavirus, and in rural outposts where opposition to vaccines runs rampant. In these communities, deep distrust of government and the U.S. health care system has collided with the state’s high-stakes effort to finish vaccinating its 34 million vaccine-eligible residents.
These are places where state health officials believe they can change a significant number of minds. But the Newsom administration is struggling to do so, public health experts say, hampered by its inconsistent and hastily developed public messaging and outreach campaign that relies too heavily on private advertising firms and companies such as Google and Blue Shield of California.
“Many people don’t trust information being put out about vaccines because it’s coming from private companies that have profit-seeking motives,” said Dr. Tony Iton, a senior vice president at the California Endowment, which focuses on expanding health care access for Californians. It served as Alameda County’s public health officer from 2003 to 2009.
What actually works, Iton and other public health experts say, are well-funded, locally designed operations led by organizations that have built trust with residents and are capable of going door to door to dispel vaccine mythology, such as local nonprofits, county health departments, and community clinics. But California’s 61 local public health departments have been stunted by years of declining revenue, budget cuts, and staff reductions that have stymied their ability to conduct the expensive and time-consuming public health outreach campaigns necessary to combat vaccine skepticism and hesitancy.
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“When something like covid-19 comes along, local knowledge is absolutely invaluable in reaching every pocket of that community, particularly in building trust in vulnerable populations,” Iton said. “The state doesn’t have that, Google doesn’t have that, and certainly Blue Shield doesn’t have that.”
Even the Newsom administration’s internal polling shows its efforts are faltering.
“The resounding barrier to vaccination,” state officials wrote in the latest survey published in June, “has been confusion as a result of inconsistent, contradictory or insufficient messaging from government and public health officials.”
Statewide, nearly 60% of Californians are fully vaccinated, but progress is uneven. Just 39% of eligible Black residents and 40% of Latinos had been vaccinated as of Friday, and local public health officials are intensely worried about regions like the Central Valley, where vaccination rates have stalled, especially given the threat of covid’s dangerous delta variant. Similar disparities exist by geography, across regions and even among neighborhoods.
