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“It’s extremely difficult to see so many people die and then be told on Facebook or at Walmart that you’re a liar,” Sunny said. Sometimes it came from relatives of the patients she was caring for.
“We have had people accusing us of giving their loved one something else to die and we could report it as Covid. We have heard more than once that we are falsifying the numbers, or killing people on purpose to make Covid look like it’s worse than before, or to make it look real when it isn’t, ”she said.
Sunny has asked CNN not to use his real name because some staunch Covid-19 deniers have harassed healthcare workers or tried to fire those who speak out.
The politicization that led people to believe that Covid-19 was some kind of scam is now affecting the number of people vaccinated.
The sunny fears that could mean the Delta variant will make many in its community sick and cause some nurses to quit.
“A lot of nurses are suffering from compassion fatigue. And I’m really scared of how it’s going to play out, because a lot of the cases we’re seeing are people who have not been vaccinated.”
“The nurses were really the symbol of this pandemic and all the hate was centered around us – the hate, the fear, the respect, all of that,” Sunny said. Lots of nurses are suffering from PTSD from 2020, she said: “And now people come and look us in the face and say, ‘No, I didn’t get the vaccine, and now I am. sick. “
What locals say about vaccinations
CNN scoured the western part of Arkansas last weekend, asking people if they would get vaccinated.
At a convenience store in Mena, Arkansas, Joy Starr said her 8-year-old son caught Covid-19. “He was sick a lot,” Starr said. “He’s been very sick for a while. And he’s still sick. He’s got stomach trouble. So I’m going to get him checked out and see if there’s any further damage. I don’t know, I mean, because he got real sick. Fever every day for weeks. And upset stomach. “
Would she and her son get vaccinated? “No. No vaccine,” Starr said. “I don’t trust the government.”
At a nearby barbershop, Mike Clark said, “I haven’t and won’t” get the vaccine.
“I’m not a guinea pig, there’s no way,” Clark said. “I think it’s a freedom issue and I’ve been wearing a mask probably for an hour or less during this whole Covid thing.” He said he was 74, the perfect age to get it. “If it’s so communicable, why am I still standing?”
The man who cut his hair, Ronnie Rodgers, said he wouldn’t either. Rodgers said he caught Covid-19 and then later had a heart attack. He thought he might have a bad reaction to the vaccine. Of course, Covid had been politicized, Rodgers said. “It was the red hats against the blue masks.”
Not everyone here feels like this, of course.
CNN met Billy Ray Jones, the mayor of Nashville, Arkansas, at a car wash. He said he was vaccinated, but told us where to find people who were not.
In Norman, a man who ran a garage sale said he was also vaccinated.
“It’s better to try your luck on the spot than to try your luck on the Covid,” he said. “Go ahead, cowboy, and go ahead, take a picture, and come out of there like an adult.” He was wearing a cowboy hat and said to call him “Cowboy”.
How nurses tried to fight misinformation
Hazel Bailey was working as a nurse in Hot Springs last August when she contracted Covid-19. She remembers taking an ambulance to the hospital. She woke up 42 days later. She had been on a ventilator and then had a tracheostomy tube to help her breathe. She would not leave the hospital for almost two more months.
“While I was in intensive care, once I finally woke up it would be day and night, I would hear codes called – code blue, which meant someone was dying “said Bailey. She could tell it was mostly Covid-19 patients. “It broke my heart. I was crying. And I was just praying for these people. Because I was in the same shape that they were.”
“I have family who don’t say it’s not real – they believe it’s real, but they’re not affected by the vaccine,” Bailey said. “They understand that some people understand, and that’s okay. But I got it and it was wrong.”
Bailey’s sister was at home while Bailey spoke with CNN. Her sister confirmed that she would not receive the vaccine, but declined to be interviewed about it. She said her comments would not be suitable for television.
“Our lives have changed. Our lives will never be the same after Covid,” Bailey said. “And when I say that, I mean our country. We will never be the same again because of Covid.”
Other nurses texted her thanking her for speaking up. But his videos weren’t always well received.
“I am called a crisis actor all the time,” she said, referring to the conspiracy theory that victims of mass casualty events are actually actors paid by the government. “It’s my thing now to respond to hateful comments with, ‘For just $ 10 on my Venmo account, I’m going to tell you the truth about Covid-19 and the crisis. “”
So far, she says she’s made around $ 100. “I’m just like ‘Isn’t the crisis game real. And Covid is real. Surprise! I said I would tell you the truth, not the truth you wanted to hear.'”
When Sunny meets Covid deniers in real life, she says she usually cries and then awkwardly walks away. She even saw it within her own family.
“My own dad – whom I love and who is a great person – I had to show him, like, no it’s real,” she said. He was slowly convinced by “looking at what it did to me personally – getting phone calls from me while at work where I’m just crying… There have been so many deaths.”
He got vaccinated.
CNN’s Eric Levenson contributed to this report.
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