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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
World
Hannah Harris Green

Republican mistrust in healthcare widens US health gap, study finds

a sign reads 'flu shots available'
A banner encouraging flu vaccines remains outside the Hattiesburg Clinic in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, on 10 February 2026. Photograph: Rory Doyle/The Guardian

Growing Republican mistrust in the healthcare system has widened health disparities between liberals and conservatives, who are more likely to avoid vaccines and the medical system in general, according to a new study.

Neil O’Brian, a political science professor at the University of Carolina, Chapel Hill and one of the authors of the study published in Nature Human Behaviour, said that his team saw two phases to the phenomenon.

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