JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The Jacksonville Center for Clinical Research say it needs more participants, specifically minority volunteers, to sign up for their COVID-19 vaccine trials.
JCCR staff say they face setbacks when recruiting Black and other minority participants mainly due to the history of abuse with clinical trials and African-Americans.
"The Black community has disproportionately been devastated by COVID-19 virus," Sharon Smith explained. "But they’re inadequately represented with studies that are going to basically come up with a cure or prevention for this disease.
Smith is the Vice President of recruiting for JCCR. In order to properly test a new vaccine, Smith says they need a group of patients that are diverse in order to see if and how the vaccine works on different people.
Nurse coordinator for JCCR Crystal Brown says there are several factors that play into the Black communities fear of trials including the lack of representation in the medical field and the history of abuse in trials.
“I definitely believe it’s something that’s long rooted within the Black community," said Brown, "unfortunately because of the past with the Tuskegee experiments. The Black community is well aware of that and it’s caused a lot of mistrust.”
The Centers for Disease Control says the Tuskegee Study was conducted "without the benefit of patient informed consent". It started with 600 Black men with a "purpose of recording the natural history of syphilis in hopes to justify treatment programs for Black people."
The study began in 1932 and the CDC says the study went on for more than 40 years. The Black men involved we’re not given all the facts required to consent and in 1972, a review panel decided that the study was “ethically unjustified”.
“The history of the black community in clinical trials is not pretty," Smith said.
There are multiple benefits to participating in a trial including being compensated for your time and travel as well as getting free medical care. Brown says it's also about taking part in research that can help future generations.
“We know from research that the Black physiology is different from other ethnic groups," Brown said.
"We metabolize medications differently, react to them differently and so it is imperative that the Black community is represented and other minorities are represented so that we know exactly what these vaccines are going to do for us and if they’re gonna be effective."
Brown is in charge of many parts of a study, one being to recruit and explain trials to patients.
“My passion has been patient education," Brown says. She says she makes sure to take her time with patients to explain the study fully in terms anyone can understand.
Brown says being a Black woman in the research field for 20 years has given her a unique perspective and she is passionate about getting the Black community to be involved.
The vaccine trials begin in July, but there is time to sign up now. You can click here for more.