Pro-Trump counties now have far higher COVID death rates : Shots ...

Polling, vaccination and mortality data all suggest that Republicans lag far behind in vaccination and are suffering the worst consequences as a result.Since May 2021, people living in counties that voted heavily for Donald Trump during the last presidential election have been nearly three times as likely to die from COVID-19 as those who live in areas that went for now-President Biden. The data also reveal a major contributing factor to the death rate difference: The higher the vote share for Trump, the lower the vaccination rate.The analysis only looked at the geographic location of COVID-19 deaths. "His situation took a nosedive like you can't believe." Phil Valentine died in August about five weeks after he announced he had tested positive for COVID-19.Misinformation appears to be a major factor in the lagging vaccination rates. The Kaiser Family Foundation's polling shows Republicans are far more likely to believe false statements about COVID-19 and vaccines. The most widely believed false statement was: "The government is exaggerating the number of COVID-19 deaths."Hamel says that underestimating the severity of COVID-19 appears to be a major reason why Republicans in particular have fallen behind in vaccination: "We've seen lower levels of personal worry among Republicans who remain unvaccinated," she says. "That's a real contrast with what we saw in communities of color, where there was a high level of worry about getting sick." Complacency around the risks of contracting COVID-19 certainly seemed to be a major reason why the Valentine brothers avoided vaccination. Thanks to Emily Gurley, Professor of the Practice and Emily Pond, Research Data Analyst, both of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health for discussions about our methodology.NPR's Huo Jingnan contributed to this story.This story has been updated to clarify the relationship of political partisanship to vaccination status.Additionally, Florida's counties were removed from the analysis after publication because we learned that Florida has not updated county-level death numbers since June 3, 2021. With the removal of these 67 counties, heavily Trump counties go from a 2.73 times higher death rate than heavily Biden counties to 2.78 times more.This story has been updated to clarify the relationship of political partisanship to vaccination status.Additionally, Florida's counties were removed from the analysis after publication because we learned that Florida has not updated county-level death numbers since June 3, 2021.