Bipartisan efforts are needed to reduce the growing rural-urban gap in Covid-19 vaccinations, Oklahoma prof says

The pandemic is waning, but so are are rates of new Covid-19 vaccinations, leaving wide swaths of the country – especially rural areas – more vulnerable to the disease and acting as potential reservoirs for mutations of the coronavirus into more contagious or deadly strains.

Through January, 59% of rural residents had received a first dose of a vaccine, but 75% of urban residents had, and that gap has more than doubled since April 2021, according to a study by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

CDC graph, adapted by The Rural Blog

The divide is particularly stark among children and teenagers who need parental consent to get vaccinated," notes Angel Adegbesan of Bloomberg News. "Only about 15% of children ages 5-11 have been vaccinated in rural areas, compared with 31% in urban areas."

However, Adegbesan writes, "In President Joe Biden’s National Covid-19 Preparedness Plan there’s a glaring omission: efforts to improve on high levels of vaccine hesitancy in rural parts of the U.S. . . . While the administration says it has improved vaccine equity among adults of different races and ethnicity, particularly in rural areas, vaccination among children and adolescents remain alarmingly low.

Perhaps it’s time to consider a bipartisan approach."

So says Matt Motta, a political scientist and an assistant professor of political science at Oklahoma State University. He told Adegbesan, “We need more of an effort, not just from the Biden administration, but from Republicans who are sympathetic and enthusiastic about vaccinating.”

Adegbesan notes, "Partisanship remains a major contributor to vaccine hesitancy. Unvaccinated adults are now three times more likely to lean Republican than Democratic, according to a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation. And those who refuse to be vaccinated are also less likely to vaccinate their children."

"Motta says people might be more amenable to getting the vaccine if someone in their community who shares the same political beliefs encourages them to do so," Adegbesan reports.