How many Americans will die because Republicans don't trust COVID vaccines?

America will soon have enough vaccines to inoculate everyone in the country against coronavirus, but many more Americans may have to catch the virus before we reach herd immunity because of vaccine skepticism.

"As President Biden pushes to vaccinate as many Americans as possible, he faces deep skepticism among many Republicans, a group especially challenging for him to persuade. While there are degrees of opposition to vaccination for the coronavirus among a number of groups, including African-Americans and antivaccine activists, polling suggests that opinions in this case are breaking substantially along partisan lines," The New York Times reported Monday. "A third of Republicans said in a CBS News poll that they would not be vaccinated — compared with 10 percent of Democrats — and another 20 percent of Republicans said they were unsure. Other polls have found similar trends."

As America approaches an abundance of vaccines, the math becomes clarified: more people may need to catch the disease to reach herd immunity because of those rejecting the vaccines.

It was against this backdrop that Fox News personality Tucker Carlson pushed vaccine skepticism on Monday evening.

Carlson begged that people not dismiss his question, "how necessary is it for people to take the vaccine?"

In reality, that question has not been dismissed as health experts have repeatedly and consistently pushed the importance of vaccination, stressing that it is safe and effective.