Rural Tennessee’s Vaccine Hesitators

White Republican evangelical Christians remain disproportionately mistrustful about coronavirus inoculations. Here’s what that looks like in one community.

Listen and follow The Daily
Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher

Vaccine hesitancy is a major reason that many experts now fear the United States will struggle to attain herd immunity against the coronavirus.

And while many initially hesitant demographics have become more open to vaccinations, one group is shifting much less: white Republican evangelical Christians, who tend to live in rural communities.

We visited one such community in Greeneville, Tenn.

In Greene County, of which Greeneville is the county seat, around 31 percent of adults are vaccinated, compared with a national rate of 56 percent.

Dr. Daniel Lewis, the community’s family doctor, is trying to change that. Often, one appointment at a time.

On today’s episode

Jan Hoffman, a reporter covering behavioral health and health law for The New York Times.

Background reading

Reluctance to get vaccinated is widespread in white, Republican communities like this one in Appalachia. But it’s far more complicated than just a partisan divide. Read Jan’s reporting here.

There are a lot of ways to listen to The Daily. Here’s how.

Transcripts of each episode are available by the next workday. You can find them at the top of the page.

Jan Hoffman contributed reporting.

The Daily is made by Theo Balcomb, Lisa Tobin, Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Annie Brown, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Larissa Anderson, Wendy Dorr, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh Young, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, Sindhu Gnanasambandan, M.J. Davis Lin, Austin Mitchell, Neena Pathak, Dan Powell, Dave Shaw, Sydney Harper, Daniel Guillemette, Hans Buetow, Robert Jimison, Mike Benoist, Bianca Giaever, Liz O. Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Rachelle Bonja, Alix Spiegel, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano and Soraya Shockley.

Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsverk of Wonderly. Special thanks to Sam Dolnick, Mikayla Bouchard, Lauren Jackson, Julia Simon, Mahima Chablani, Nora Keller, Sofia Milan, Desiree Ibekwe, Laura Kim, Erica Futterman and Shreeya Sinha.

Site Index

Site Information Navigation

Source: Read Full Article