Americans Have High Trust in Health Care Providers: Poll

Doctors, nurses, and pharmacists are highly trusted by most Americans, a new survey shows.

Those health professionals do what is right either most or all of the time, said at least seven in 10 respondents in the poll from the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy and the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. There were high levels of trust among men and women, Democrats and Republicans, and among Blacks, Hispanics, and Whites, according to the AP.

Trust in health care providers could be an important factor in efforts to boost COVID-19 vaccination rates in the United States, experts say. "Public health officials should really look to doctors, nurses, and pharmacists to be the megaphone to deliver the message of the importance of getting vaccinated," Michelle Strollo, a senior vice president in the NORC Health Research Group, told the AP.

A June survey by the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation revealed that Americans trusted doctors for information about COVID-19 vaccines more than other sources, such as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the nation's top infectious disease expert, Anthony Fauci, M.D.

Recently retired cardiologist Paul Vaitkus said he encouraged many of his patients, some of whom have been seeing him for years, to get the vaccine due to their health conditions. He thinks they listened to him. "As a doctor, my patient knows me and they sized me up eye to eye," the 62-year-old Gurnee, Illinois, resident said. "They know that I'm honest."