Anti-COVID-19 Vaccine Narratives Among African and North American Neo-Pentecostals (Part 2): Public Health Impacts and Theological Response to Leadership Gaps and Lessons.

This study concludes a two-part interdisciplinary study examining the relationship between religious beliefs, actions, and health behaviors. Through a literature review, secondary data, and available media narratives, it examines the reactions of some African and North American Neo-Pentecostals during the pandemic. Part 1 revealed that the causes of anti-COVID-19 narratives, resistance, and hesitancy are historical, social, economic, theological, and technological (new media) (Orogun, 2026). This final exercise (Part 2) responds to the narratives and causes from public health impact and spiritual leadership perspectives. The public health implications discussed include (1) increased mortality and leadership vacuum, (2) families and communities' grief, trauma, and emotional distress, and (3) broken trust in the government and health authorities. The spiritual leadership response articulated robust theological precedents in times of plagues and related health crises to show (a) the theology of medicine that shaped the worldview of leaders in biblical history and (b) the algorithm of strategies they deployed to manage plagues and related health challenges. Finally, lessons are presented to close the anti-COVID-19 narrative gaps in view of possible recurrence.