三位前总统本月表示，他们将获得冠状病毒以增强美国人对疫苗安全性的信心。
“我可能最终会把它拍成电视或电影，只是为了让人们知道我信任这项科学，而我不信任的是获得COVID，”前总统说巴拉克·奥巴马在一次SiriusXM面试。
通过发言人，前总统乔治·布什和比尔·克林顿，美国有线电视新闻网证实美国广播公司新闻报道说，如果有助于鼓励美国人接种疫苗，他们也会在镜头前接种疫苗。
周五，副总统迈克·彭斯在白宫的一次电视直播活动中接种了新冠肺炎疫苗。他的妻子卡伦·彭斯和卫生局局长杰罗姆·亚当斯也接种了疫苗。亚当斯此前曾谈到给像总统和公众这样的高知名度个人接种疫苗健康官员们，在“早安美国”的采访中亚当斯说:“像我这样的人接种疫苗是有象征意义的。
安东尼·福奇博士也赞成。“我会接种疫苗，我会公开接种疫苗，”福西上周告诉《美国医学会杂志》。
北卡罗来纳大学吉利恩斯全球公共卫生学院健康行为教授诺尔·布鲁尔认为，公开接种疫苗不仅仅是政治游戏。
虽然研究人员认为疫苗布鲁尔解释说，导致更多的人接种疫苗，增加这种信心是棘手的。“非常有效的是让领导人支持疫苗接种系统和个体疫苗，”他说。“让他们主动在镜头前接种疫苗是可能发生的最重要的事情之一。”
这也是一个有历史先例的举措。
2009年，奥巴马在接种H1N1疫苗时为白宫摄影师卷起袖子。“人们需要明白这种疫苗是安全的，”他说美国城市无线电网络当时。“米歇尔和我自己刚拍了照片，”他说。“我们想在全国范围内确保儿童比成年人更早得到它。现在有了足够的疫苗，成年人也应该接种。”
在新泽西州的一个军事基地发现猪流感后，杰拉尔德·福特总统也在镜头前卷起袖子，这是他1976年为全国所有人接种疫苗运动的一部分。但是福特的竞选包括快速追踪疫苗在选举年。当没有大流行发生，4000万接种疫苗的人中有30人死于疫苗的不良反应时，疾病控制和预防中心的可信度受到了影响。
虽然福特是一个反面教材，但布鲁尔指出，当领导人不支持疫苗接种时，可能会产生破坏性后果。
布鲁尔的一项研究去年发表在《疫苗》杂志上研究发现，当丹麦当局对质疑人类乳头瘤病毒疫苗安全性的新闻报道反应迟缓时，女孩的疫苗接种率下降了14%。
布鲁尔和他的合著者写道，尽管丹麦当局最终介入，“媒体负面报道的时期让超过26000名年龄较大的女孩没有接种疫苗，否则她们会接种疫苗”。“随着时间的推移，错过的剂量可能会导致多达180例可避免的宫颈癌和45例死亡。”
最终，结合策略，如低成本和可获得的疫苗接种计划，加上可信的公众人物自己接种疫苗，比任何单一的方法都更有效。
“底线是，这真的是好消息，”布鲁尔谈到前总统的疫苗承诺时说。
“特朗普接种疫苗也会很有成效，”他补充说。
Why 3 former presidents said they'd get the COVID vaccine on camera
Three former presidents said this month that they would get thecoronavirusvaccine publicly in order to boost Americans' confidence in the vaccine's safety.
"I may end up taking it on TV or having it filmed, just so that people know that I trust this science, and what I don't trust is getting COVID," former PresidentBarack Obamasaid during aSiriusXM interview.
Through spokespeople, former Presidents George Bush and Bill Clinton,confirmed to CNNand ABC News that they would also get the vaccine on camera if it would help encourage Americans to get vaccinated.
On Friday, Vice President Mike Pence was vaccinated for COVID-19 during a live television event at the White House. His wife, Karen Pence, and Surgeon General Jerome Adams also received the vaccine. Adams had previously talked about vaccinating high-profile individuals, like presidents and publichealthofficials, during an interview on "Good Morning America." "There's a symbolic part of someone like me getting vaccinated," Adams said.
Dr. Anthony Fauci was also in favor. "I will get vaccinated and I will get vaccinated publicly,"Fauci told JAMA last week.
Offers to get vaccinated publicly isn't just political theater, according to Noel Brewer, a professor of health behavior at UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health.
While researchers believe that confidence invaccinesleads to more people getting vaccinated, increasing that confidence is tricky, Brewer explained. "What is very effective is having leaders stand up for the vaccination system and for individual vaccines," he said. "Having them offer to get vaccinated on camera is one of the single most important things that could happen."
It's also a move with historical precedent.
In 2009, Obama rolled up his sleeve for White House photographers while getting the H1N1 vaccine. "People need to understand that this vaccine is safe," he toldAmerican Urban Radio Networksat the time. "Michelle and I just got the shots ourselves," he said. "We wanted to make sure nationwide that children were getting it before adults did. And now there's enough vaccine so that adults should get it as well."
President Gerald Ford similarly rolled up his sleeve on camera as part of his 1976 campaign to vaccinate everyone in the country after swine flu was detected at a New Jersey military base. But Ford's campaigninvolved fast-tracking a vaccineduring an election year. When no pandemic came to pass and 30 people out of the 40 million vaccinated died from adverse reactions to the vaccine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's credibility suffered.
While Ford is a cautionary tale, Brewer pointed out that there can be damaging consequences when leaders don't stand up for vaccination.
A study Brewerpublished last year in the journal Vaccines, found that when authorities in Denmark were slow to respond to news stories that questioned the safety of the HPV vaccine, vaccine uptake among girls fell 14%.
Although the Danish authorities eventually stepped in, "the periods with negative media coverage left over 26,000 older girls unvaccinated who would have otherwise received the vaccine," Brewer and his co-authors wrote. "The missed doses may, over time, translate to as many as 180 avoidable cervical cancers and 45 deaths."
In the end, combining strategies, like low-cost and accessible vaccination programs coupled with trusted public figures getting vaccinated themselves, works better than any single approach.
"The bottom line is that this is really good news," Brewer said of the former presidents' vaccine pledge.
"Trump getting vaccinated would also be very productive," he added.
