Dr. Anthony Fauci wants Black Americans skeptical about the COVID-19 vaccines to know a Black woman was at the forefront of creating one of them ... so fear not.
The nation's leading infectious disease expert spoke Tuesday at an event hosted by the National Urban League and, while discussing racism in medical research and how it's created mistrust ... Fauci put a spotlight on the contributions of Black scientists in the historic development of COVID vaccines ... most notably Dr. Kizzmekia Corbett.
While it might have sounded awkward, Fauci was simply addressing the elephant in the room -- a new study shows only 14% of African-Americans trust the vaccine will be safe and only 18% trust it'll be effective. That's alarming, considering a large portion of the country needs to get vaccinated in order to beat the virus which has disproportionally affected people of color.
Corbett's a pretty big deal in the medical research world. She's the lead scientist for coronavirus vaccine research at Fauci's National Institute of Health. She was also part of the team that worked with Moderna to develop its vaccine that's expected to get emergency use authorization from the FDA and be rolled out later this month.
Fauci added, "So, the first thing you might want to say to my African-American brothers and sisters is that the vaccine that you're going to be taking was developed by an African-American woman. And, that is just a fact."