Vaccine Hesitancy in America
At the end of the day vaccine hesitancy, like so many challenges, comes down to one question: How do you change someone’s mind about something?
Each of the people in this 7-part Docuseries I directed and shot has thought long and hard about this question. These short films set out to capture some of the different ways that trusted voices are working to get hesitant people in their communities to take the shot. We can all learn so much from them, not just about overcoming vaccine hesitancy, but about how hearts and minds get changed.
These films were underwritten by Walgreens and produced by Slipstream, a production company I co-founded that is focused on documenting the greatest health challenges facing America.
EPISODE 1: Overcoming a Painful Legacy.
Johnny Ford first became mayor of Tuskegee, Alabama in 1972, the year news broke of the notorious Tuskegee Experiment that would shatter African American trust in the medical establishment for generations. Despite this tragic legacy, Mayor Ford says, with trusted Black scientists and doctors leading this vaccination effort no one should use what happened in Tuskegee as a reason not to get vaccinated now.
How do you convince someone to get the Covid vaccine? Baltimore barber Kennard Perry does it by giving his customers a safe space to talk, and listening closely. One haircut at a time, he’s countering misinformation and helping men in his community work through their lingering questions and concerns.
Episode 2: The Good Listener.
How do you convince someone to get the Covid vaccine? Baltimore barber Kennard Perry does it by giving his customers a safe space to talk, and listening closely. One haircut at a time, he’s countering misinformation and helping men in his community work through their lingering questions and concerns.
Episode 3: Caring for the Heartland.
Dr. Jen Brull cares for multiple generations of farming and ranching families in the small Kansas town of Plainville, where vaccine hesitancy and distrust run high. Through a combination of persistence, care and respect, Dr. Brull is bringing her patients around to the vaccine one-by-one.
Episode 4: A Matter of Faith.
Reverend R.B. Holmes uses the power of the pulpit, and his faith in God and science, to call upon parishioners in his Tallahassee Baptist church to get vaccinated. “We must be our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers,” he reminds them. “I am appealing to you, and young Americans, that it is your moral obligation to get vaccinated.”
Episode 5: Battling Time and Tide.
The coast of Maine is dotted with thousands of tiny islands, fifteen of which still have year-round residents. In a race against time, nurse Sharon Daley and the Maine Seacoast Mission brave rough seas and gale-force winds to get the Covid vaccine to islanders and safeguard these remote communities against the virus.
Episode 6: Manos a la Obra.
Gladys Vega is a boots-on-the-ground activist in Chelsea, Massachusetts who will do whatever it takes to keep her predominantly Latinx community safe. Knowing many undocumented immigrants are fearful to come in for vaccinations, Vega and her team are going door to door to reassure and sign up her neighbors.
Episode 7: Twice the Trust.
Dr. Elana McDonald and Dr. Delana Wardlaw, aka the “Twin Sister Docs,” care for patients in the same underserved Philadelphia neighborhoods where they grew up. With empathy and a deep cultural understanding of the communities they serve, they’re doubling down on getting vulnerable populations vaccinated.
Executive Producers: Rego Marquiis Stefan Clark
Director\Cinematography: David McLain
Producers: John Fox, Jerome Thelia, Megan Kelty
Editors: Jenna Dini Bliss, Kenneth Kerr
Assistant Editor: Anna Pellecchia
Music Composer: Garth Neustadter
Sound re-recording mixer: Andre Kelman
Colorist/post-sup: Jerome Thelia