Philadelphia Medicine Fall 2020 - 6

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In vaccine
we trust
FEATURE

With COVID-19, building
confidence in health care
strategies crucial for local,
national organizations
By Andy Andrews, Editor

ow do you build trust?

For American frontline health care workers, emergency responders, long-term
care providers and the general public, generating a sense of confidence in a welltested, proven vaccine for COVID-19 will take some work.
It's all about trusting the science.

"For reasons that have to do with a combination of factors, vaccine confidence is at an
all-time low, at least in my lifetime," said Dr. Peter Marks, director of the Center for Biologics
Evaluation and Research at the Food and Drug Administration.
Marks spoke during an American Medical Association webinar in October.

'You have my word,
to the extent that
anyone will listen to
me, that politics is
going to stay out of
this process.'
- Dr. Peter Marks, director of
the Center for Biologics Evaluation
and Research at the Food and Drug
Administration

Philadelphia Medicine : Fall 2020

Why the lack of confidence? It's a combination of misinformation provided by social
media bloggers and anti-vaccine proponents that can exert influence quickly on an indiscriminating public.
"That's because we no longer see and feel the incredible benefit of vaccines," Marks said.
"Nobody understands the fact that none of us really see smallpox. If we saw it, we wouldn't
know it unless we saw it in a textbook."
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, in partnership with the FDA
and AMA, is reaching out with a series of AMA-sponsored webinars to give health-care
professionals the tools they need to help restore confidence.
"Even in this era of uncertainty, and of myths and misinformation spreading so easily on
social media, in any group when we ask patients about their most trusted source of information when it comes to vaccines, we are told that they will look to their own health-care
providers," said Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization
and Respiratory Diseases, or NCIRD, for the CDC. Health care providers "will play a
critical role in helping develop confidence in COVID-19 vaccination."

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Philadelphia Medicine Fall 2020

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