Fresno County aims to get kids vaccinated against COVID, despite hesitancy, misinformation

Amber Crowell waited more than two years to get her 4-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son vaccinated against COVID-19. But even after federal health officials recommended the shot for children ages 6 months and older two weeks ago, the Mexican mother struggled to find a medical provider in the San Joaquin Valley to administer their shots.

Her family’s health care provider, Kaiser Permanente, was offering the vaccine in Stockton but not Fresno or Clovis, she said. She checked local pharmacies as well as national health retailers and grocery stores and, she said, “they weren’t vaccinating children under three.”

“I don’t know what parents with babies are doing, because it was very difficult to find a place for kids under 3 (years old),” said Crowell, an associate professor in Fresno State’s sociology department. “That, I think, is one of the biggest challenges even for parents who want to vaccinate their kids.”

Latinos make up nearly 60% of Fresno County’s 0- to 17-years-old children population. Of the 90,458 youth vaccinated with at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine as of mid-June, the county estimated 54% of those children were Latino. That’s just over a quarter of the county’s total Latino youth population.

Now, as county health officials and advocates work to promote vaccination among this community, vaccine access could be just one challenge they’re confronting. Other factors — including hesitancy, misinformation and the need for culturally and linguistically appropriate vaccine information — could also slow down the process.

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An estimated 27% of parents said they would “definitely not” get their child vaccinated and 11% said they would only do so if required, the Kaiser Family Foundation reported in an April survey. Another 18% of parents said the were were eager to vaccinate their kids right away and 38% said they planned to wait a while to see how the vaccine worked for others.

Among parents of kids under age 5 that were interviewed for the survey — which was conducted before the U.S. Centers for Disease Control recommended the shots for the youngest kids — a majority said they didn’t have enough information about the vaccine’s safety and effectiveness.

That’s why county health officials are partnering with community organizations to dispel misinformation and encourage Fresno County’s Latino families to get vaccinated, especially as more doses become available.

The county health department has received more than 2,000 vaccine doses for young children and “does not anticipate any problems with vaccine supply/and or distribution,” spokesperson Sim Dhillon said in an email to The Fresno Bee.

“The COVID-19 vaccine is safe and effective,” said Marlen Miranda, project lead with Cultiva La Salud, a Fresno-based organization dedicated to creating health equity in the Valley. “It prevents us from going to the hospital or possibly dying. The vaccine has protected a lot of lives.”

Misinformation about COVID-19 vaccine is rampant

Throughout the pandemic, medical misinformation has spread rampantly among the Latino community and proven to be a major barrier to vaccination.

These days, misinformation is spreading about the pace at which the COVID-19 vaccines were developed and what safety protocols were followed, according to Dr. Trinidad Solis, a family medicine physician serving as Fresno County’s deputy health officer.

“These vaccines — similar to the routine vaccines for other childhood diseases — had to pass through all the phases of the (Food and Drug Administration),” she said.

People also spread misinformation contending that kids do not get sick from COVID-19 — or at least not as sick as adults. But kids do indeed get sick, especially with the current omicron variant, and some have required hospitalization, she said.

The digital divide — access to and understanding of technology — has also been a barrier to vaccinating the Latino community, Solis said. Though some families may have access to smartphones, “that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s easy to navigate websites to register for COVID-19 vaccines,” she said.

Immigration status should not be a barrier to vaccination, she added.

Anyone six months old and older can get vaccinated in California regardless of their immigration status. The Fresno County Department of Health doesn’t ask for immigration information from anyone getting vaccinated, she said.

Vaccine events cater to Fresno’s Latino children, families

Given these challenges, the county’s health department has made “a great effort” to develop and deliver culturally and linguistically appropriate health information, Solis said. Community-based organizations have helped distribute the county’s health information, too.

Partnering with community groups to approach people in both Spanish and Indigenous languages, “has been a great strategy in helping increase our vaccination rate,” Solis said.

One of those groups, Cultiva La Salud, has been providing vaccine outreach and information outside of local markets, carnicerías (butcher shops) and panaderías (bread shops), “where we know Latino families frequent,” said Miranda.

The organization is also doing door-to-door canvassing, she said, so they can talk one-on-one with community members who may have concerns about the shot.

Now that young children are eligible for vaccination, the organization is also turning its focus to daycare centers and homes, she said. “We are looking into collaborating with the WIC (Women, Infants and Children federal nutrition program) offices and childcare centers where we have infants,” she added.

Cultiva La Salud is also organizing vaccine clinics around the county, featuring tacos and aguas frescas, as well as gift cards, face-painting for kids and entertainment.

Miranda has seen kids enter vaccination events nervously, “but the nurses are really great at calming them down,” she said. “Sometimes it’s more the fear than the poke in their arm.”

‘Virtually no risks’ to vaccination, Fresno mom says

Crowell’s kids were 2 years old and 8 months old when the COVID-19 pandemic began.

After 16 months at home triple-timing as an employee, daycare provider and mother, it was excruciating to wait for her children to become vaccine-eligible, she said. It was especially anxiety-provoking when they returned to daycare, where none of the other kids are vaccinated, she said.

So when Valley Children’s Hospital tweeted recently that they were hosting a vaccine clinic for children, Crowell signed up. Both of her children finally got their first shots in late June.

For her, it was an easy decision.

There are, “virtually no risks,” to vaccination for kids under age 5, “and there are only benefits,” she said. While COVID-19 is widespread in the community, vaccination “does increase your child’s safety and make it so that even if they do get sick, their risk of having to be hospitalized for it goes down.”

In fact, her kids did get sick — a week after getting their first doses of the vaccine.

While Crowell said she can’t tell whether the vaccine protected her kids or not, since they got sick so soon after getting their first dose, their pediatrician said the shot might have alleviated their symptoms a little bit.

Still, Crowell said, “I certainly do wish the vaccine had been available for them sooner.”