Personal experiences with COVID-19 have strong impact on vaccine acceptance, study finds
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Close and personal experiences with COVID-19 were strong determinants of vaccine acceptance compared with distal experiences, such as those in the media, according to a survey conducted in multiple countries, including the United States.
In general, researchers found that vaccine acceptance was higher among respondents who had more serious and closer experiences with the disease, according to findings presented during the virtual Annual Conference on Vaccinology Research sponsored by the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases.
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“The group I’m a part of started looking at predictors of COVID-19 vaccination intent last year,” Kaitlyn Akel, a research assistant and MPH candidate at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, told Healio. “I had a growing interest in people’s experiences during the pandemic as a predictor for vaccine uptake, which served as the premise for this paper.”
Akel and colleagues administered a cross-sectional opt-in online survey twice once in August 2020 and once in November 2020 in the U.S. (nAugust = 782, nNovember = 986), China (nAugust = 788, nNovember = 939), Taiwan (nAugust = 673, nNovember = 663), India (nAugust = 804, nNovember = 957), Indonesia (nAugust = 727, nNovember = 800), and Malaysia (nAugust = 760, nNovember = 738).
According to the study, the surveys asked about the seriousness of each participant’s COVID-19 experiences and the concerns of each participant related to accepting the COVID-19 vaccine.
Overall, the responses demonstrated that vaccination intent increased with higher severity and proximity of experiences, Akel and colleagues reported. According to the responses, COVID-19 vaccine acceptance was higher among those who had more serious and proximal experiences with COVID-19 in most locations, with the exception of Indonesia, where witnessing serious cases in the media had a higher impact on vaccine acceptance.
Additionally, the study showed that the impact of an individual’s experience on vaccine acceptance was stronger in August 2020 than it was in November 2020, with the exception of Taiwan, where prevalence increased between the two time points, potentially in reaction to a spike in cases.
According to Akel, responses were not that drastically different between countries, and the majority followed the same pattern. She explained that in the U.S., participants with serious personal experiences were nearly 40% more likely to accept a COVID-19 vaccine than those with no experience, and for serious media experiences, participants were about 16% more likely to accept a COVID-19 vaccine. The exception was Indonesia, where participants with serious media experiences were about 33% more likely to accept a COVID-19 vaccine. This number was about 12% for serious personal experiences.
“Serious, proximal experiences confer higher vaccine intent in a number of cases, although media certainly has a strong influence in matters, too,” Akel said. “Given how prevalent media exposures can be, this has strong implications for future interventions related to vaccine messaging going forward.”
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Akel K, et al. Do COVID-19 experiences affect vaccine acceptance? Evidence from six countries. Presented at: NFID Annual Conference on Vaccinology Research; April 26-28, 2021 (virtual meeting).
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