Beyond Tuskegee: Trust and African-Americans in America’s Health System

This chapter delves into vaccine hesitancy and medical mistrust stemming from historical and ongoing inequitable health practices. Historical events, such as the Tuskegee study, have deeply entrenched medical mistrust, eroding the trust of African Americans in the healthcare system. In recent times, medical mistrust has been sustained by misinformation, such as the false black immunity narrative that spread on digital platforms during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. While it is argued that broader institutional practices, individual encounters, and socioeconomic variables contribute to racial disparities in medical trust and vaccine uptake, newer evidence following the outbreak of COVID019 revealed that the Tuskegee legacy still impacts trust towards the healthcare system. The paper underscores the need for public health stakeholders to adopt holistic approaches to rebuild trust and address historical and current practices while improving vaccine uptake among marginalized populations, particularly the African American community.