WA Hispanic vaccine rates seriously lagging. Inslee came to Tri-Cities to find out why

Gov. Jay Inslee met with what he called some of the hardest working people in the United States at a farmerworker housing center in Pasco this week.

In a circle of chairs at Sea Mar La Posada sat a woman who said her 80-year-old husband is working at a produce packing house, another man who had traveled from California for the cherry harvest and more people, many of whom spoke to the governor through a Spanish interpreter.

Have they been vaccinated? What can he do to get more people vaccinated against COVID-19, Inslee asked.

“The more people who get vaccinated, the more people who will be alive the next holiday season,” he said.

A Washington state Department of Health breakdown of vaccination rates by race and ethnicity in April found that Hispanic residents in Franklin County were far less likely than white non-Hispanics to be vaccinated. White non-Hispanics were nearly twice as likely to be vaccinated.

About 54% of Franklin County’s residents are Hispanic, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

About 13% of people in Washington state are Hispanic, but they account for 29% of those with ethnicity known by the state who have had COVID and 22% of those who have been hospitalized with the illness.

Their working conditions, with many working in the ag industry, increases their risk of exposure to the coronavirus, Inslee said.

Many work in produce packing and processing plants with many other people and many live in multi-generational households or with other workers.

Inslee also met with some growers who said they need as many people vaccinated as possible to make sure they have crews to harvest their crops.

“Our crop could rot in the ground if we don’t have enough employees,” said Adam Weber, a Quincy potato farmer.

Last year was a challenge because exposed workers were quarantined at a time when the most workers were needed, he said.

“The vaccine is going to help us tremendously because labor is such a problem in our industry, getting enough bodies there and finding them,” he said.

COVID vaccine rumors

“A lot of people from what I’ve heard are just kind of scared of all the rumors” about the vaccine, said Victor Manuel of Pasco. He’s an aspiring musician, performing regional music of Mexico, who was raised by parents who worked long hours in the fields to provide for him, he said.

Dr. Julian Perez of the Sea Mar Community Health Centers said earlier this spring that health care providers hear rumors frequently from their Latino patients.

People may ask if it is true that the vaccine can cause infertility, that the shots are just water or that a microchip is implanted with the vaccine.

The best way to tell the Hispanic and farmworker community that the vaccine is safe is through social media, Univision and at events, Manuel said.

He encourages family and friends to get vaccinated, like him, so they can safely gather with each other again.

The worker who said he was following the cherry harvest and planned to stay in the Mid-Columbia to work more harvests until winter had not been vaccinated.

He had been told that the vaccine was only for older people right now, he said.

The vaccine is available now for even teens, the governor assured him.

“We are very hopeful you will consider getting vaccinated,” Inslee said. It’s free and he will be entered into a drawing for a $1 million prize, he added.

COVID vaccine resistance

Almost all H2-A workers — those in a program that fills temporary agricultural jobs — are vaccinated, said Mike Gempler, executive director of the Washington Growers League.

“They love it because it is hard to get vaccination in Mexico,” Gempler said. But local workers are more hesitant, he said.

The state can’t give up on getting farmworkers vaccinated as waves of new workers come in throughout the agricultural season, he said. Mobile clinics are important to reach them.

Addie Waxman of McCain Foods, which has a plant in Othello, said her Hispanic in-laws resisted getting vaccinated.

They heard misinformation and were terrified, she said.

But when a local doctor came to their church, and stood side-by-side with a priest, her in-laws and about 50% of church members chose to get a vaccination at a mobile van at the church.

McCain Foods has had one-day vaccination clinics at its plants and it has “been remarkable how many people signed up to get shots,” Waxman said.

Elíodora Rojas De Moran, whose 80-year-old husband continues to work in a packing house, said she’d received a vaccine.

That was after recovering from COVID. She believes she was infected in the community kitchen at La Posada last year, where dozens of agricultural laborers pass through day and night.

She told the Tri-City Herald this summer that she had been fearful of infecting her husband.

COVID vaccine progress

“The work ethic in the agriculture industry is so amazing,” Inslee said.

State and local vaccination programs are making progress, he said, both with mobile clinics and by providing information to agriculture workers.

“When they get the truth, they get the vaccination,” he said.

“The people who are in hospitals struggling for breath are the people who have not had the vaccine,” he said. “We really want to save lives and I’m gratified from what I’m hearing from the ag industry (about) trying to get more people vaccinated.”

The Benton Franklin Health District has helped organize on-site vaccine clinics at food processing plants in the Tri-Cities area and has a Spanish-language radio campaign featuring trusted leaders in the Hispanic community that provides information on the COVID-19 vaccine.

This story was originally published June 17, 2021 at 12:04 PM.