Health experts and leaders in McLennan County are hosting a virtual town hall about the vaccine in Spanish.

Waco city councilman Hector Sabido who will be moderating the town hall said they’re doing this in hopes of getting information out to the Hispanic community, which has been heavily affected by Covid-19.

“We think it’s important to let the Spanish-speaking community know that it is safe to take the vaccine. That in fact, we encourage you to take the vaccine to keep yourself, your community and your family members safe,” Sabido said.

Experts on the panel include physicians like Dr. Iliana Neumann at the Waco Family Health Center, who said it’s important to clear up any misinformation.

“We don’t want to overwhelm people with information, and we do want to address some of their questions so there will be a time to address some of the myths that we hear come up more often regarding the vaccine,” Dr. Neumann said.

According to the Waco-McLennan County Public Health District, there have been about 23,000 Covid-19 cases since the pandemic began in March. A total of 29% of those cases have been people in the Hispanic community.

Dr. Neumann said they hope that by getting information out about the vaccine, it will help save lives.

“By addressing the concerns that as soon as the vaccine becomes available for more and more people, that people will get vaccinated because we know that the faster we can do this, the faster we can decrease the hospitalizations, the deaths, and the tremendous suffering both physical emotional and financial,” Dr. Neumann said.

The goal with the town hall is to remove the barriers of fear and distrust in a community that has been disproportionately impacted by the virus.

Both Sabido and Dr. Neumann invite everyone to join and to share the information with Spanish-speakers in the community.