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Vaccinating the Community
Leveraging My Role as a Community Provider to Promote Vaccinations in the Black Community

Released: February 12, 2025

Expiration: February 11, 2026

Jacinda (JAM) Abdul-Mutakabbir
Jacinda (JAM) Abdul-Mutakabbir, PharmD, MPH, AAHIVP
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Key Takeaways
  • Representation is crucial in addressing vaccine disparities.
  • To leverage messages about the importance of vaccination in communities, healthcare professionals including pharmacists, should engage with faith leaders, provide effective vaccine education, and offer immunizations in low-barrier community vaccination clinics.

As a pharmacist and as a Black person, I have a unique opportunity to leverage messages about the importance of vaccination as preventive healthcare for the Black community. Here’s my approach and why I believe it’s important. 

Vaccine Disparities
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the CDC had documented racial and ethnic disparities in vaccination uptake—particularly flu vaccinations. Flu vaccination was consistently low among Black Americans, and subsequent hospitalizations for flu were much higher compared with White Americans. 

This same pattern emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic. At the height of the pandemic, minoritized populations in the United States had significantly higher rates of infection, hospitalization, and death compared with their non-Hispanic White counterparts. Of note, Black individuals were less likely to be vaccinated against COVID-19, irrespective of the availability of the vaccine in their local community.

My local community, San Bernadino County, illustrated this point well. Loma Linda University housed the largest mass vaccination clinic site, and Black individuals were underrepresented among clinic vaccinees—despite representing more than 20% of COVID-19 hospitalizations in the county.

Vaccine Hesitancy
To correct this imbalance, we need to address vaccine hesitancy, which can be attributed to 3 main factors: confidence, complacency, and convenience. 

Confidence
Lack of confidence in vaccines may reflect lack of trust in their effectiveness and safety, but it may also indicate lack of trust in the healthcare system. During the COVID-19 pandemic, we witnessed a lot of questioning of preventive healthcare practices among many Americans. Unfortunately, within the Black community, trust in the American healthcare system has additionally been shattered by a history of systemic racism and injustices inflicted on Black individuals. Further, when compared with White Americans, Black Americans are less likely to have a primary care provider in whom they trust.

Complacency
Complacency can stem from mistrust and low concern about the disease; individuals may perceive that their risk of acquiring an infection or suffering from severe disease is low. As frontline healthcare professionals (HCPs) (and especially as pharmacists), we all have a role in explaining the risks in a way that patients will understand.

Convenience
Convenience includes ease of delivery and scheduling. Scheduling vaccination opportunities that were inaccessible by public transportation was another factor that may have negatively impacted uptake, as Black individuals are more likely to rely on mass transit.

Furthermore, minoritized individuals are less likely than their non-Hispanic White counterparts to have computers in their homes. Thus, any online sign-up system may be out of reach.

In addition, a lack of employer-provided health insurance may be an additional limitation for Black individuals, as they are more likely to occupy hourly waged occupations that may not offer insurance options.

Faith-based Organizations
To help address the disparity in vaccine uptake in the community I serve, I collaborated with faith-based organizations in the area, including the Inland Empire of Concerned African American Churches and the Congregations Organized for Prophetic Engagement. Our community-academic partnership had a primary goal of restoring trust in the vaccine and increasing vaccine uptake among San Bernardino County Black residents.

3-Tiered Approach 
In addition, we provided immunizations in an easily accessible forum: free of cost, no digital sign-up, and minimal transportation required. This partnership used a 3-tiered approach to address vaccination barriers, including:

  1. Engaging Black faith leaders to help spread the word that the vaccine was safe
  2. Providing vaccine education
  3. Providing immunizations in low-barrier community vaccination clinics

As a racially concordant HCP, I leveraged my lived experiences to coordinate efforts with the faith-based organizations and to tailor the vaccine education to suit our community’s needs.

This approach resulted in the provision of more than 3600 vaccine doses and 15 educational sessions attended by more than 300 individuals. More importantly, there has been a notable change in vaccine acceptance as this tiered approach has been used to encourage immunization uptake for other preventable diseases. 

Importance of Representation
The role of Black pharmacists as HCPs, educators, and advocates for minoritized communities remains vital. Representation is crucial in addressing vaccine disparities.

First, we can continue to educate the community about the availability of up-to-date COVID-19 vaccinations and inform them about the payment coverage options for these immunizations. Our efforts can also extend to promoting other essential vaccinations for adults, including RSV, shingles, and hepatitis B.

In addition, we can collaborate with local and state health departments to facilitate vaccination programs in easily accessible locations for the target populations. We can also advocate for funding aimed at initiatives that address accessibility barriers to all vaccinations.

Your Thoughts?
What strategies have you used to reduce vaccine disparities and address vaccine hesitancy? Join the discussion by posting a comment below.