Communication and Perspectives About COVID-19 and Vaccinations Among Native Americans

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affected Native American people and communities across the United States. Despite unequal losses during the pandemic, Native Americans have high vaccination rates. We provide insight into perspectives of COVID-19 and vaccinations through in-depth interviews with Native Americans. Through this research, we provide a holistic view of how Native Americans perceive vaccines by pairing Indigenous perspectives of risk and the Health Belief Model. We discuss the importance of tribal sovereignty in developing health communication strategies, and the need for messaging that is trusted and culturally appropriate.

“Let’s get back to normal”: emotions mediate the effects of persuasive messages on willingness to vaccinate for COVID-19

“…To assess whether our sample of vaccine hesitant/resistant individuals was consistent with previous literature ( 3 , 13–15 ), we first identified whether individuals were hesitant/resistant or not. Based on participants’ score on vaccine hesitancy (i.e., an average score higher than 3, the neutral point on the scale), participants were coded as vaccine hesitant/resistant (23%) or vaccine confident (77%).…”

“…Indeed, several studies have been conducted to examine COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in terms of worldwide rates of hesitancy, personal characteristics of hesitant individuals, and reasons for being hesitant [e.g., ( 3 , 13–15 )]. For example, drawing from large samples in Ireland and the United Kingdom (UK), Murphy et al ( 3 ) found that 35 and 31%, respectively, of these samples were vaccine hesitant/resistant.…”

“We rely on each other”: A qualitative exploration of rural Eastern Region Native American experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…Qualitative research has explored the unique challenges NAs faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, including vaccine decision making among NAs living in urban [ 5 ] and reservation [ 6 ] settings, barriers to educational delivery [ 7 ], perceptions of COVID risk [ 8 ], testing [ 9 ], and impact on economic resources [ 10 ]. However, very limited research has focused on COVID-19 pandemic experiences among East Coast tribes [ 11 ], whose contexts and challenges may be different than tribes located within other US regions.…”