Vaccine-skeptical Trump country poses challenge to immunization push

“We’ve got fairly good trust — but there’s a block of the community, or the population, who thinks that this is a hoax, that it’s to exert control to limit people’s freedom,” said Mike Holmes, who for over 40 years has been CEO of Scenic Rivers Health Services in one of the most rural regions of Minnesota. “That’s a hard group to convince.”…

Of course, rural America isn’t monolithic — it isn’t all white, Republican and poor. It’s found in pockets of the bluest states, as well as vast stretches of the red ones. But reaching the most vaccine skeptical in those communities — which polls regularly find are white, Republican and under 50 — will be a messaging challenge that helps determine the pandemic’s trajectory in the coming weeks and months.

Rural hospital closures and higher uninsurance rates, particularly in the dozen conservative states that did not expand Medicaid under Obamacare, leaves more low-income people without a regular place for medical care, without a doctor or nurse that knows them, who they trust. That trusted voice is often the one most able to cut through the noise around vaccines…

Given the high degree of hesitancy among Republicans and rural Americans, a coalition of health groups and foundations turned to Frank Luntz, a prominent GOP pollster and message crafter. He found that lecturing, shaming or even appealing to abstract notions of doing what’s right doesn’t change minds. What resonated is emphasizing how vaccines can make people and their loved ones safe — and how it can help life return to normal.