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President-elect Joe Biden's team is feverishly working to get a messaging plan in place to sell a skeptical public on the first FDA-backed coronavirus vaccine, believing the Trump administration has set the effort back significantly. Biden implied on Friday that he’s not going to wait until he takes office to start counteracting Trump’s mixed messaging on the vaccine, which includes downplaying the public health threat of the coronavirus while hailing the unprecedented speed at which a shot was developed. (Roubein and Goldberg, 12/12)

The Trump administration, scrambling to make up for lost time after a halting start, is rushing to roll out a $250 million public education campaign to encourage Americans to take the coronavirus vaccine, which will reach the first patients in the United States this week. Federal officials acknowledge the effort will be a complicated one. It must compete with public doubt and mistrust of government programs amid deep political divisions created in part by a president who has spent much of the year belittling government scientists, promoting ineffective treatments and dismissing the seriousness of the pandemic — and is now rushing to claim credit for a vaccine that he has made a priority. (Gay Stolberg and Shear, 12/13)

Dr. Stephen Hahn, the commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), said on Sunday that resistance to the COVID-19 vaccine by some Americans is a “significant problem” and officials are working to address those “fears and concerns.” Host Martha Raddatz noted during Hahn’s appearance on ABC’s “This Week” that recent polling shows between one-quarter and one-third of Americans do not want to receive a vaccine. (Balluck, 12/13)

After 110,000 deaths ravaged the nation’s nursing homes and pushed them to the front of the vaccine line, they now face a vexing problem: Skeptical residents and workers balking at getting the shots. Being first has come with persistent fears that the places hit hardest in the pandemic — accounting for nearly 40% of the nation’s death toll — could be put at risk again by vaccines sped into development in months rather than years. Some who live and work in homes question if enough testing was done on the elderly, if enough is known of side effects and if the shots could do more harm than good. (Condon and Sedensky, 12/14)

Gov. Tate Reeves recently said among his biggest concerns about a COVID-19 vaccine is whether people will take it. He has reason to be worried. Mississippi has the lowest coronavirus vaccine acceptance rate in the nation at 43%, according to survey results published in September by The COVID States Project, a coalition of university researchers. Reeves also has a front-row seat to the Magnolia State’s vaccine skepticism and conspiracy theories: His Facebook page is awash in them. (Ramseth, 12/13)

Former Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton announced earlier this month their intentions to get vaccinated against Covid-19 — potentially on live television — to bolster trust and confidence in the shots among Americans. Following their lead, President-elect Biden said he too would take a vaccine on camera, as did Anthony Fauci, the nation’s most visible virologist. Ivanka Trump also signaled her willingness to get inoculated publicly. (St. Fleur, 12/14)