Former US presidents Barack Obama, George W Bush and Bill Clinton have said they would volunteer to get their Covid-19 vaccines publicly to promote confidence among people in the vaccine’s safety once the US Food and Drug Administration authorises one, reports CNN.
They also expressed hope that an awareness campaign to promote confidence in the safety and effectiveness of the vaccine would be a powerful message to the American people as public health officials try to convince them to take the vaccine, according to the CNN report.
Bush’s chief of staff Freddy Ford told CNN that the 43rd US President had reached out to the nation’s top infectious disease expert Dr Anthony Fauci and the White House coronavirus response coordinator Dr Deborah Birx to see about how he could help promote the vaccine.
Ford told CNN that the former US president will volunteer for his vaccine after the vaccines are deemed safe and administered to the priority populations.
He will gladly do so on camera, Ford added.
Former president Clinton too would be willing to take the vaccine in a public setting in order to urge all Americans to do the same, as soon as the vaccine will be available to him based on the priorities set by public health officials, his press secretary Angel Urena told CNN on Wednesday.
Obama, in an interview with SiriusXM host Joe Madison scheduled to air Thursday, said if Dr Fauci, also the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that a coronavirus vaccine is safe, the former president would believe him since he had worked with him before and trusts him completely.
“I promise you that when it’s been made for people who are less at risk, I will be taking it,” Obama said in the interview. “I may end up taking it on TV or having it filmed, just so that people know that I trust this science, and what I don’t trust is getting Covid-19.”
CNN has also reached out to representatives for former US President Jimmy Carter to know if he would be willing to take Covid-19 vaccine publicly.❐
