Targeted COVID-19 vaccine outreach to black and Hispanic adults could help close the gap between communities of color and white people, a new study finds.
Researchers from Stanford University in California built three models to project how the Covid vaccine rollout would have played out had there been different levels of uptake in different communities.
In the model that continued the vaccine rollout at the pace it was already going, 50 percent of white American adults would receive at least one shot of the COVID-19 vaccine two months before black and Hispanic Americans reached that marker.
In the model where vaccine rates were doubled for minority groups due to targeted outreach, that margin shrinks to only two weeks, highlighting the need for the more specific forms of outreach.
Researchers found that if disparities in vaccine uptake across races continued beyond April 2021, it would take black Americans an additional two months to reach 50% vaccine coverage when compared to white and Asian Americans (left). With targeted outreach, the vaccine uptake rate could double, and the gap in time could shrink to only two weeks (right)
Black and Hispanic Americans faced some additional barriers to receiving the COVID-19 vaccine, such as scheduling and transportation issues. Many black Americans are also skeptical of the shots due to a history of medial malpractice in the U.S. Pictured: A Hispanic woman in Miami, Florida, receives the COVID-19 vaccine
‘The disparities in vaccination among Black and Hispanic adults seen in this study highlight the urgent need to invest in policies and interventions to promote vaccine equity,’ researchers wrote.
‘Our results additionally demonstrate the benefits of place-based targeting of efforts to promote vaccination uptake.’
The researchers, who published their findings Wednesday in JAMA Network Open, built three separate models for the study.
The first was the ‘persistent differential uptake’ model, where disparities in vaccine uptake between racial groups that existed in April 2021 would continue.
In this model, Asian and white Americans reached 50 percent vaccine coverage at some point in mid-April.
Hispanic Americans would not reach that point until early May, and black Americans lagged significantly behind, not reaching that mark until mid-June – two months after white and Asian Americans did.
The second model created by the Stanford team equalized the uptake from beyond April – assuming that an equal share of each racial group would be getting vaccinated.
In this model, white and Asian Americans reach 50 percent vaccine coverage in early April and Hispanic Americans reach the mark around three weeks later towards the end of the month.
Black Americans still lag behind in this model, though, not reaching the 50 percent mark until mid-May.
The third and final model assumed that there would be geographical targeting in certain communities falling behind the others in vaccine uptake.
In this scenario, vaccine uptake doubles in black and Hispanic communities due to the increased outreach, and assumptions that some existing barriers faced to receiving the vaccine are removed.
White and Asian Americans still reach 50 percent in early April, as the targeted outreach has little effect on their vaccination rates.
It makes a drastic impact on the vaccination rates of black and Hispanic people, though.
Hispanic Americans reach the 50 percent mark in mid-April, and black Americans reach that point in late April – within two weeks of white people reaching that point.
Researchers believe that these results show why vaccine outreach needs to be more targeted at groups lagging behind the others.
The racial disparities in American health care have been put under a spotlight during the COVID-19 pandemic, with black and Hispanic Americans struck harder by the virus and also less likely to have received a COVID-19 shot when available.
Black Americans are most likely to face barriers like transportation and scheduling difficulties to receiving the Covid shots.
A study published in June found that in major cities like New York City, vaccination sites were primarily concentrated in white neighborhoods instead of areas where black people lived.
There is also lingering vaccine skepticism among some black Americans due to a history of the the U.S. government using them to dangerously test medicine on them without their consent.
Targeted efforts to make vaccines more easily available in these communities could help close these gaps, and alleviate some of these issues.
