Cuomo wants to launch a public education campaign to combat the skepticism that he helped incite over the coronavirus vaccine.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Wednesday that "First we're going to have to have a real public education campaign to battle the skepticism" over the vaccine. This after he expressed skepticism of the vaccine in November.
Cuomo wants to launch a public education campaign to combat the skepticism that he helped incite over the coronavirus vaccine.
NY Gov. @AndrewCuomo: "We're going to have to have a public education campaign to battle the [COVID-19 vaccine] skepticism." pic.twitter.com/vtXCUMkp1B
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer)
"Just think of the math on this," he said, "you have to get to 75 percent to 85 percent of the overall population vaccinated for the vaccine to be effective," he said.
"Fifty percent of the population says right now they don't want to take the vaccine. They don't trust the approval process, they're worried about vaccines in general," Cuomo said.
"You cannot get to 75 percent if 50 percent don't take it, even I can do that math."
Cuomo had previously said that he'd rather stop the distribution of the vaccine than allow the Trump administration to roll it out.
Now he's calling for a "public education campaign to dispel the skepticism that already exists."
"It's good news/bad news, George," he told ABC's George Stephanopolous on Good Morning America in early November.
"The good news is these Pfizer tests look good and we'll have a vaccine shortly. The bad news is that it's about two months before Joe Biden takes over, and that means this administration is going to be implementing a vaccine plan."
Trump had said that because Cuomo was so dismissive of the vaccine he would not provide it to New York. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell spoke out against Cuomo for "undermining public confidence" in COVID-19 vaccines and "performatively opposing" Trump.
Cuomo went on to say that the vaccine roll out needs to be "done in a way that protects social justice. The health care system discriminates against black, brown, and poor communities. By effect you have fewer health care facilities in poorer communities. That is a fact," he said.
"Higher death rate in these communities, higher infection rate in these communities, higher percentage of essential workers in these communities, so we want to make sure when we do the vaccine that it is done in a just and fair and equal way."
He also said the vaccine rollout will be a "massive undertaking" and that he wants to expedite it. Much like CNN's determination that the same vaccine is dangerous under Trump but perfectly fine under Biden, Cuomo seems to have the idea that the same vaccine of which he was skeptical one month and proclaimed would not allow into his state ago is now safe enough to warrant a wide-spread roll out.
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