Spectrum News: Latin woman in vaccine trial gets vaccinated, encouraging other minorities too
UC researcher uses bilingual skills to raise Latinx community involvement in vaccine trial
When UC and UC Health launched the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine trial last summer, one of the main goals for the researchers was to recruit as diverse of a population as possible. One of the central figures in that effort was Shaina Horner, a clinical research coordinator in the UC College of Medicine Division of Infectious Diseases.
Horner worked with Cristina Morgan of the local Latinx community to get her and her parents to be among the 185 participants in the study. Spectrum News interviewed Horner and Morgan about that process.
Morgan’s mother was initially skeptical about her participating in the 25-month vaccine trial.
“Her first reaction was like, ‘What are you doing?” says Morgan. “What is going to happen to you are you? Are you going to catch it? Are they going to inject you with the virus? Are you going to get sick?”
From left: Cristina Solis Mendiola, Cristina Morgan, Jose Octavio Aleman Ruiz and Shaina Horner/Photo/Colleen Kelley/UC Creative + Brand
Horner helped put her mind at ease.
“We need to know that this vaccine works for everybody and we also want to make sure that communities that have been significantly impacted by COVID like the Black and LatinX community have the opportunity to be a part of the solution,” Horner told Spectrum.
It was Horner who Morgan said helped her mother get over her fears of the vaccine.
“She has answered every question I’ve had,” she says. “She has answered every question that my mom and dad have had and everything has been quick, it has been nice, and we just get all the information directly from the team who are working on this.”
Read more about Horner's work here.
Lead image of Cristina Morgan and Shaina Horner/Colleen Kelley/UC Creative + Brand.
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