COVID cases are rising again. How do we get more SLO County residents vaccinated?
Listen up: COVID-19 is alive and well in San Luis Obispo County.
Last week, County Public Health announced three additional deaths — the first since May 17 — all in unvaccinated patients. Three deaths are far fewer than what we saw during the height of the pandemic, but those are still three lives taken too soon.
There also were 70 new cases, which was nearly double the 36 cases reported the previous week.
Other California counties are in even worse shape.
Los Angeles County just mandated masks indoors — again — even for the fully vaccinated. Officials there suspect unvaxxed people haven’t been wearing masks at indoor venues. A blanket, masks-for-all mandate is mostly intended to protect them.
Other counties are recommending everyone mask up in indoor venues like indoor shopping malls and supermarkets.
San Luis Obispo County has not, but if this keeps up, it could be just a matter of time.
Vaccination rates still lag
Health officials continue to reassure us that vaccinations provide excellent protection. Statistics bear that out; according to Los Angeles County health officials, 99% percent of current cases and deaths they’re seeing are in unvaccinated patients.
The CDC is calling this a “pandemic of the unvaccinated.”
That should be enough of a sales pitch. It’s not.
For one thing, statistics like these are too impersonal and, therefore, easier to shake off.
We need to know about the cases here in San Luis Obispo County, not for metro areas like Los Angeles or San Francisco.
So far, our county has not been able to provide detailed information on how many new cases are in unvaccinated vs. vaccinated patients.
Nor are we hearing much about the Delta variant, beyond the fact that it has been confirmed here. That’s a big concern, because the Delta mutation is much more contagious than other strains.
“The local data you are requesting is not easy to gather, especially for a particular set of cases,” a County Public Health spokesperson said via email. “But so far, what we are seeing in SLO County is consistent with what has been reported on the state level in terms of variants and cases in fully vaccinated vs. unvaccinated people.”
What to do about holdouts?
Despite the widespread availability of COVID vaccines, there are still too many holdouts who have yet to be vaxxed.
Statewide, 59.6% of Californians were at least partially vaccinated as of Friday. We’re a bit behind in San Luis Obispo County, where Friday’s stats were 56.4% partially vaxxed and 49.9% fully vaccinated.
That means only half us have been fully protected from a deadly pandemic.
Like many other states, California has tried a variety of ways to increase the vaccination rate, including:
Appealing to a sense of duty: It will help protect your community! And safeguard your grandparents!
Gentle bribery: You’ll be able to travel, attend concerts, eat at indoor restaurants!
Outright bribery: You can win up to $1.5 million in the vaccine lottery!
Shaming: Psychologists tell us that’s never effective, yet there’s been plenty of that going on, by both sides.
Mandating: The University of California just announced it’s requiring all students and staff to be vaccinated before coming back to campus this fall, even though vaccines don’t yet have full federal approval. This makes sense, since vaccination rates are low among college-age people. Let’s hope the CSU system, which includes Cal Poly, follows suit.
Politics of the pandemic
Unfortunately, the pandemic has been treated as a political, rather than medical, issue almost from the get-go, with masking, social distancing and vaccinating coming under attack.
We can only hope that a decent percentage of unvaccinated people aren’t falling for lies, but rather, have been too preoccupied to get their shots — possibly because they fall into a low-risk group and don’t believe they’re at risk of becoming seriously ill or dying — or have questions or concerns that have yet to be answered.
What’s the best way to reach them?
Interestingly, researchers say it’s best not to criticize any mistaken beliefs.
“One thing that we’ve learned very clearly is not to correct misperceptions because people feel as though we are being dismissive,” Rupali Limaye, a health communication scientist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told Scientific American.
She suggests saying something like this: “There’s a lot of information out there, and some of it is true, and some of it is not true. Let me tell you what I know.”
Researchers also advise targeting groups with campaigns that are more in line with their values.
For instance, appeal to Republicans — who are among the vaccine-averse — with information about how it will help the economy.
That makes sense; if our local Republican Party hasn’t already tried that, it should give it a shot.
More facts, please
It is a challenge to get complete information out quickly, but let’s not underestimate the power of data.
At the very least, going forward we should be able to find out whether deaths and hospitalizations in San Luis Obispo County are in vaccinated or unvaccinated patients.
And let’s talk for a minute about those “breakthrough” cases in people who have been fully vaxxed. We’re told such cases are rare, and yet it seems more and more anecdotal reports are circulating.
On Thursday, for example, a Yankees-Red Sox game was hurriedly called off at the last minute after some players tested positive for COVID — including at least three who had been vaccinated, according to a New York Times report.
We’ve been told that even if we do get a breakthrough case, it’s likely to be mild. If that’s what we’re seeing here, can we find that out?
We are all tired of this pandemic. We want it to be over. But the recent surge is proof that it’s not done with us yet.
COVID-19 continues to kill, and the unvaccinated are the most susceptible. Stark reminders that our friends and neighbors right here in San Luis Obispo County are among the victims may be our best hope of beating it, once and for all.
This story was originally published July 18, 2021 at 7:00 AM.