BF2S Forums Pandemic thread

SHEFFIELD, Ala. — George Grabryan and Mike Melton have been helping people here on the bank of the Tennessee River survive devastating tornadoes, floods and other disasters for decades. Ask any local official in rural Lauderdale County, and they have the two emergency managers’ numbers saved in their phones — just in case.

But Covid-19 has broken those bonds. Despite Grabryan and Melton’s best efforts, only 34 percent of county residents are vaccinated, even as the highly transmissible Delta variant has driven up new infections by 300 percent in the last two weeks. Three people have died, and health officials predict that many more will follow before the summer mist lifts off the cornfields.

Many people here and elsewhere in the Southeast are turning down Covid-19 vaccines because they are angry that President Donald Trump lost the election and sick of Democrats in Washington thinking they know what’s best. State and local public health officials have struggled to combat that deep-rooted obstinance. But they don’t want more on-the-ground help from the White House, fearful it would prolong the current surge — even as the Biden administration has begun approaching southern states with offers to send federal “surge teams” on door-knocking campaigns.

The pushback from both state officials and people who refuse vaccination underscores the extent to which the federal government may never be able to convince rural, conservative populations in parts of the South to get the shot. And it raises questions about how the Biden administration will shape its response to Covid-19 over the next several months as more schools and businesses reopen and Delta spreads.

“To say that politics doesn’t play a part would be wrong,” Melton said. “I think the national figures get people talking about the vaccine and that can sometimes take the wrong fork in the road and go the wrong way.”

Local public health officials and physicians in this part of the country are convinced that they are doing everything they can to save lives — pulling 15-hour days to set up pop-up mobile vaccine units, monitor patients on respirators, and administer rounds of therapeutics. But they can only do so much. They will not go to people’s homes to try and twist their arms, they say, and they do not want federal officials to do so either.

“I don’t know going door to door would help us,” said Karen Landers, an Alabama state health officer based in Sheffield. “People in more rural areas … you’re going on to their property. It might not be the best idea to have them do that because people are protective of their privacy.”

One day last week in Sheffield, Melton and Grabryan were sitting in a large van in front of a local church. Its parking lot displayed a small white sign advertising Covid-19 vaccine to anyone who wanted it.

Only 18 people showed up. It’s been like that for weeks. At one point, Grabryan laid his head back on the van’s cushy seat, shaking it side to side. “I've been out to the funeral home for more visitations this year than I have before,” he said. “There’s no one in this area that doesn’t know someone who was affected by it.”

Grabryan can’t understand what’s holding people back. But then again, maybe he can.

The amount of misinformation and disinformation propagated on Facebook is enormous, he said, and it’s convincing people everywhere in the county that the vaccine is a government plot or unsafe for use.

“Until it starts hitting here really bad again, these people aren’t going to get the shot,” Melton added.

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