Newswise—New York, May 31, 2022 – A new 23 countries study by a multidisciplinary team of researchers from the journal Vaccinepublished by Elsevier, sheds light on factors contributing to COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among healthcare providers.
To assess associations between self-reported vaccine hesitancy and a number of sociodemographic and COVID-19 vaccine perception factors, CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy (CUNY SPH) Principal Investigator Jeffrey Lazarus, PhD , Dean Ayman El-Mohandes, MBBCh, MD, MPH, FAAP, and colleagues from Dalhousie University School of Health Administration, Halifax, Canada and Barcelona Institute for Global Health, Barcelona, Spain, have developed a cross-sectional survey on perceptions of risk, efficacy, safety and confidence and current uptake of the COVID-19 vaccine.
The survey was administered to 23,000 adults in Brazil, Canada, China, Ecuador, France, Germany, Ghana, India, Italy, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, Poland, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, UK and US in June 2021. Of those surveyed, 3,295 identified themselves as service providers. health care, such as doctors, nurses and community health workers.
Responses revealed that while most healthcare providers received one or more doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, a substantial minority reported hesitation. Four hundred ninety-four (15.0%) of participants said they would be reluctant to accept a COVID-19 vaccine, and 132 (4.0%) of them said they would refuse it outright.
Of the health care providers surveyed, physicians were the least hesitant. Vaccine hesitancy was more likely to occur among people with income below the median income and, to a lesser extent, younger people. Safety and risk concerns and lack of confidence in the equitable distribution of vaccines were strongly associated with hesitancy, less so than concerns about the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines.
Previous studies aimed to gauge the potential acceptance of a COVID-19 vaccine among healthcare providers, but few have been published since vaccines became widely available.
“These findings are troubling,” says Dean El-Mohandes. “Since healthcare worker hesitancy can negatively influence community perceptions, particularly among patients and family members, and may contribute to their refusal or delayed uptake of the COVID-19 vaccine. “
“Vaccine hesitancy can hamper the potential success of global vaccination campaigns and, therefore, our ability to control the COVID-19 pandemic,” says Dr. Lazarus. “Trainings and campaigns that reinforce vaccine safety, the dissemination of scientific data underpinning vaccine development, and clear, consistent and comprehensive information and commitment supporting the equitable distribution of vaccines are all potentially useful strategies to encourage hesitant healthcare professionals to get vaccinated. »
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Notes for Editors
This article is “Factors Affecting COVID-19 Vaccination Hesitancy Among Health Care Providers in 23 Countries” by Jeanna Parsons Leigh, Stephana J. Moss, Trenton M. White, Camila A. Picchio, Kenneth H. Rabin, Scott C. Ratzan, Katarzyna Wyka, Ayman El-Mohandes, Jeffrey V. Lazare (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.vaccine.2022.04.097). It appears as an article in the press in the newspaper Vaccinepublished by Elsevier.
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About CUNY SPH
The CUNY Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy (CUNY SPH) is committed to promoting and sustaining healthier populations in New York City and around the world through excellence in education, research, and service in public health and advocating for healthy policies and practices to advance social justice and improve health outcomes for all. sph.cuny.edu
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Vaccine is the go-to journal for those interested in vaccines and immunization. It is the official journal of the Edward Jenner Society and the Japanese Society of Vaccinology and is published by Elsevier www.elsevier.com/locate/vaccine
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