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We finally have the coronavirus tamped down, with caseloads dropping and the momentum of the vaccinations on our side. The only thing that might derail this now is if we give the new variants enough oxygen to mount a comeback, as happened in the pandemic of 1918.

Thats what were seeing now in Europe, where cases are surging as the more contagious variants take root. None of these new variants interfere with the vaccine. But future variants might. The danger is that, like the Spanish flu, this novel virus could keep mutating.

It has the potential to wreak havoc again, yes, says Perry Halkitis, Dean of the Rutgers School of Public Health, who compared it to a super-strain of HIV for which many of our medications stopped working.

I think it is a race against time, Dr. Stephen Thomas, SUNY Upstate Medical Universitys chief of infectious disease, just told the New York Times. Every single person that we can get vaccinated or every single person that we can get a mask on is one less opportunity that a variant has.

That means getting the injection as soon as its available to you. This is a community effort; well only achieve the protection we all need if everybody gets the jab. The group posing the biggest challenge is Republican men: 49 percent say they would not be vaccinated, compared to 37 percent of Latinos and 25 percent of Black people.

African American hesitancy is born of a historic distrust, and documented abuses. But Republican men are even more hesitant due to hypermasculinity, Halkitis says a sense of invincibility that interferes with their health. For these guys, its sort of like this anti-authoritarian, screw-the-man emotional life that they live in, where they feel cast aside and put upon, that interferes with their rational decision-making.

They need to understand that they are sabotaging this whole effort. Think of somebody in your life who can get sick and die. Envision that person hooked up to a ventilator, as nurses rush from bed to bed. Picture shuttered businesses, as this virus continues to spread. If you want our economy to get off life support, do your part: Get the shot.

Halkitis thinks of his own father, an immigrant from Greece who died at age 57, because he distrusted doctors and feared seeking out treatment for the stomach pain that turned out to be cancer. I personally think that there should be an accountability and responsibility by the FCC for people spreading false information, he adds. We got all bent out of shape about Janet Jacksons boob on the Super Bowl, but we allow falsehoods to propagate in our society.

That former President Trump did finally advise his supporters to get vaccinated helps. I would recommend it to a lot of people that dont want to get it and a lot of those people voted for me, frankly, he said on Fox News this week. It wasnt helpful, of course, that Trump got his vaccine quietly before leaving the White House, or that Fox News world is still messaging to viewers that rejecting facts from vetted sources about vaccinations is just the mark of an independent thinker.

More than 95 percent of doctors who have been offered the vaccine have gotten it as soon as they can, which speaks volumes about its effectiveness and safety. They know that tens of thousands of people participated in vaccine trials last year, and decades of prior research went into its development. But Fox News talking head Tucker Carlson never mentions that.

The next time he does his quizzical squint and asks, how effective are these vaccines? Are they safe?, and then refuses to answer any of his own questions, remember this: His billionaire employer, Rupert Murdoch, got the Pfizer vaccine the moment it was available to him in December. Theres your answer, folks. And, while youre at it, wear your mask.

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The final barrier to beating this virus: Republican men | Editorial - NJ.com