With inoculation rates dropping nationwide and the highly contagious Delta variant driving new infections in nearly every state, the White House faces increased urgency to combat a right-wing misinformation war on COVID-19 vaccines without playing into the hand of Republicans politicizing the vaccination effort. The Biden administration is planning to take a harder line against vaccine-related misinformation propagated by GOP officials and on social media platforms alike, CNN reports, a stance some administration officials have already started to take. “Health misinformation is a serious threat to public health,” U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said in an advisory Thursday, calling it “a moral and civic imperative” for tech companies and others to fight such falsehoods.
Administration officials “said a decision had been made” to “call out Republican elected officials and specific social media platforms” in the coming days and “are planning a call to attention more than a call to action,” according to CNN. Just this week, the administration took on vaccine skepticism through a variety of strategies, from Vice President Kamala Harris encouraging health workers in Detroit to “get the facts out” about the vaccine to teaming up with pop star Olivia Rodrigo to promote the vaccine among young people. The White House is trying to affirm the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines to young Americans—currently the eligible age group with the lowest vaccination rates thus far—by capitalizing on Rodrigo’s massive social media reach.
President Joe Biden himself may reportedly get involved in the pushback against health misinformation perpetuated by Republican officials and right-wing media, though doing so risks fanning the flames of conservatives who have cast resistance to the vaccine as a way of sticking it to their opponent—and potentially endangered their audience in the process. Fox’s anti-vaccine scare campaign has involved inaccurately conflating Biden’s door-to-door initiative to get people protected from COVID-19 as an “Orwellian” violation of personal privacy and freedom, among the misleading claims with stakes that administration officials have become increasingly willing to call out.
With outlets such as Fox News only ramping up panic about government overreach in recent days, as Media Matters finds, officials reportedly see that anti-vaccine messaging as helping drive the geographic disparity in vaccination rates, with counties that voted for Biden having higher vaccination rates. Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, recently warned of “two Americas” developing, and as the New York Times reported Wednesday, “the West and Northeast have relatively high rates of vaccination, while the South has the least.”
“In a country that should be able to end its pandemic in short order with widespread vaccination, the Delta variant is well designed to take advantage of the cultural divide,” the Times noted. And as nearly all hospitalizations and deaths are among the unvaccinated, one administration told CNN, “We are seeing the impact of the disinformation.”
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July 15, 2021 at 11:54PM
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Right-Wing Vaccine Lies Are Tearing the Country Apart - Vanity Fair
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