WASHINGTON (AP) — Thrown off-stride to reach its COVID-19 vaccination goal, the Biden administration is sending A-list officials across the country, devising ads for niche markets, and enlisting community organizers to persuade unvaccinated people to get a shot.
The strategy has the trappings of a political campaign, complete with data crunching to identify groups that can be won over. But the message is about public health, not ideology.
The focus is a group health officials term the "movable middle" — some 55 million unvaccinated adults seen as persuadable, many of them under 30. The effort comes as the White House acknowledges it will miss President Joe Biden's goal of 70% of American adults getting at least one COVID-19 shot by July Fourth.