Although counties that backed former President Donald Trump in the 2020 election are on the whole much less likely to have high vaccinated rates compared to counties that backed President Joe Biden, a new report from Vice News shows that is not universally the case.
Cassie Prather, the public health director for Woodford County, Kentucky, tells Vice that her department "got rid of every dose we had" in the early weeks of the vaccine's availability and then used a variety of tactics to keep more people coming in to get their shots.
One key lesson Prather has learned has been to rely on local people within the community as the best assets for informing Americans about the positives of the vaccines.
"We say that if you don't trust the health department or you don't trust the government, then contact your local physician or someone that you know that had COVID or got the vaccine," she explains.
Dr. Christopher Walcott of Ohio County, Indiana similarly tells Vice News that relying on a local approach is essential to creating trust among the unvaccinated.
"The people who are working in the clinic are [patients'] neighbors, grandparents, sisters, teachers of people within the community," Walcott said. "We took the politics out of it completely and made it a purely scientific endeavor."