BY JACQUELINE CHARLES, SYRA ORTIZ-BLANES, AND CAMILLE RODRÍGUEZ MONTILLA Source: Miami Hearld Featured Photo Source: Unsplash, Mustafa Omar
MARCH 17, 2021 07:30 AM
World champion sprinter Yohan Blake had just raced across a track at a meet in Jamaica when he made his position clear: He would rather miss this summer’s Tokyo Olympics than get a coronavirus vaccine.
“I am not taking it,” he told The Gleaner, a daily newspaper on the island. “I don’t really want to get into it now, but I have my reasons.”
“His position unfortunately is not that uncommon in many segments of our population,” Jamaica Health Minister Christopher Tufton said of Blake, considered the second fastest man in the world after Usain Bolt. “The difference, of course, is that he is a national talent and therefore carries influence, especially among the younger population.”
As the first vaccine shipments from a United Nations-backed initiative known as COVAX begin arriving in the region, a year after the first infections were confirmed and months after the United States and the United Kingdom began inoculating their citizens, governments are quickly realizing that the race to controlling the deadly pandemic is strewn with distrust, conspiracy theories, and an anti-vaccine campaign growing in strength.
Research by Florida International University’s School of Communication and Global Health Consortium shows that while access to a COVID-19 vaccine remains an overwhelming concern for most citizens in the region, who have been watching wealthier nations immunize their populations, hesitation over taking one persists.
“The anti-vaccine movement from Europe and the United States is gaining traction in Latin America,” said Maria Elena Villar, an associate professor of communications at FIU. “You’re starting to see an increase in that kind of messaging, often referring to content that was originally from the U.S. and Europe. It’s something to watch and to try to mitigate before it gets worse.”
Like in the United States, citizens are questioning the science and the rapid speed at which vaccines have been developed and given emergency approval. Others have doubts about the long-term effects. Then there is distrust of authorities.
How people across the region feel about their governments, tasked with administering the vaccines, has been a complicating issue throughout the pandemic. It has influenced everything from accepting the existence of COVID-19 to following mitigation efforts like mask wearing to now vaccine response.
Will you take the vaccine? Have you taken the vaccine? How has taken the vaccine impacted your health?
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