Only 16 percent of Americans believe that Russia leapfrogged American scientists and successfully created a viable COVID-19 in a recent survey. They may be the same 16 percent who believe Russian propaganda sites like Russia Today and Sputnik when it comes to food: that Russia became the world leader in "organic" food with a press release saying they were; and energy, where Russia funds environmental groups to undermine natural gas so they can control Europe using a strategic resource while Germany can claim they have a larger percent of "renewable" energy domestically than would be possible if their energy was generated locally.

Most are taking the 'let's test it and see before we roll it out' approach Americans also took when it came to Europeans rushing thalidomide to pregnant women; a level of caution that discovered its birth defect harm and prevented them here just as Europeans were discovering their error in mislabeling anecdotes as epidemiology. 

Some are downright skeptical. Baby Boomers are most impacted by COVID-19, so they would be right to be most hopeful, but they are also least likely to trust Russia after living with USSR disinformation and misinformation most of their lives. Despite needing a vaccine more than any other group, 82 percent of "Baby Boomers", which marketing groups now decree as those born in the years 1946-1964, do not trust Russia’s ‘Sputnik V’ vaccine claims even a little.



Though the leader singer of the actual band Generation X, Billy Idol, was born in the middle of what later came to be Baby Boomers, the Generation X of marketing groups are a little more forgiving toward Russians. They grew up in the era of détente and glasnost and are more inclined to regard the USSR as just another government, rather than the cause of even more deaths than Hitler, because they weren't alive during the Cuban Missile Crisis and can't remember the invasion of Czechoslovakia. Still, only 63 percent of Generation X people surveyed think the Sputnik V vaccine is little more than propaganda, or at best a vaccine that has passed phase I trials, safety and dosing.

50 percent of Millennials worry that hype and demands to do something will cause countries to bypass due processes.

Without evidence it actually does anything Americans who have been around a while aren't getting too excited, and Europe would be right to be equally skeptical. We accept science more than anyone, but we're not wrong to doubt science claims that border on magic. We don't trust endocrine disruptor claims or other homeopathy, we don't pretend solar can exist without poor people paying subsidies so rich people in Malibu can have a smaller electric bill, and we don't believe that just because a compound works on a computer or in rats it should be injected into humans.

Our innate skepticism and grasp of critical thinking compared to other countries is across all strata so successfully that only 51 percent of Americans are interested in being guinea pigs if such a rushed vaccine were introduced today. That means most want the scientific method to work. They want real clinical trials, not the statistical correlation of the week. They want 27 candidates to compete, not a government-endorsed winner chosen in advance.