Last Thursday was the first of my Community COVID Conversations in Cabot, and I am so grateful for the crowd who attended and filled every seat with the overflow left standing along the walls. The time was well spent with citizens asking questions and providing ideas as to how to overcome the hesitancy of some in getting vaccinated.
Let me describe the challenge we face. One month ago, our active COVID cases had declined along with our hospitalizations. We were increasing our vaccinations across the state, and we were very optimistic about the return to normalcy.
And then during the last month, we saw our rate of vaccinations stall at about 40 percent, and the Delta variant showed up, a right-left punch that has led to a dramatic increase in the daily number of new COVID cases, along with an increase in hospitalizations.
Someone at the Cabot meeting suggested we offer more incentives to encourage people to take the vaccine, but the success of the incentives we’ve already offered was limited. The fishing licenses and lottery tickets we offered were worth a try, but we learned that the incentive wasn’t effective in changing the mind of someone who isn’t already inclined to get a vaccination.
The most powerful incentive is the reality that if Arkansas doesn’t significantly increase its rate of vaccinations, we won’t be getting rid of COVID-19 and its spinoffs anytime soon.