MLB’s Hank Aaron publicly vaccinated to show Black community shots are safe

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MLB legend Hank Aaron publicly received his COVID-19 vaccination in an effort to “help zillions of people in this country.”

Although Aaron was officially elected to the baseball Hall of Fame in 1982, he is still inspiring the country and his fans with his platform. Aaron, along with civil rights icon Andrew Young and the first Black U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Louis Wade Sullivan, got vaccinated against COVID-19 on Tuesday.

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A video from Good Morning America shows Aaron as he receives his shot. In the video, he tells the camera, “It makes me feel wonderful. I don’t have any qualms about it at all, you know I feel quite proud of myself for doing something like this. It’s just a small thing that can help zillions of people in this country.”

As COVID-19 vaccines begin to roll out, Aaron is using his voice to bring people together in trusting medical science.

Young, according to ESPN, acknowledges that there is often mistrust within the Black community when it comes to shots and vaccinations. Referencing the atrocious Tuskegee experiment, Young explains, “I’ve been taking vaccines now for 88 years and I haven’t been sick…the truth of it is, Black folk have been living by shots, and just because they did something crazy and murderous and evil back in 1931, we’re still thinking about that. We’ve got to get over that.”

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They received their vaccinations in “a brand-new health clinic at the Morehouse School of Medicine,” and Young feels that the new clinic will make medicine “more relevant and more safe and more available to poor folks of color.” 

This comes ahead of recent news that President-elect Joe Biden plans to accelerate COVID-19 vaccine distribution. A Biden spokesperson told CBS News, “The President-Elect believes we must accelerate distribution of the vaccine while continuing to ensure the Americans who need it most get it as soon as possible.”

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