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University of Melbourne

Intention to vaccinate against COVID-19 in Australia

Description

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, we eagerly await the arrival of safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines. However, the success of any vaccination programme depends on high vaccine acceptance and uptake. Previously, Rachael Dodd and colleagues reported that 4·9% of adults in Australia would refuse a vaccine, which is low compared with estimates in the USA (20%) and France (27%). The Australian data were collected in April, 2020, 4 weeks after lockdown measures commenced, which was at a time when community transmission was perceived to be high.
As part of the Royal Children’s Hospital National Child Health Poll, we did an intention-to-vaccinate analysis in a nationally representative sample of Australian parents (n=2018) during June 15–23, 2020, and collected data via an online survey. At this time, restrictions had been eased throughout Australia and there was minimal community transmission. Compared with the earlier Australian estimates, the weighted proportion of people in our study indicating that they were unsure or unwilling to accept a COVID-19 vaccine had increased by 10·0% (14·2% in April to a weighted proportion of 24·2% in June [95% CI 7·9–12·1]; p<0·0001). Among parents who were unsure (320 [16·7%]) or unwilling (138 [7·6%]) to accept a COVID-19 vaccine, 379 (82·8%) were concerned about vaccine efficacy and safety, and 123 (26·9%) believed that a COVID-19 vaccine was unnecessary.
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DETAILS

Publication

2020

Authors

A. Rhodes, M. Hoq, M.-A. Measey, M. Danchin

Emergency

COVID-19

Scope

Social science

Language

English

Region

Asia-Pacific

Keywords

FAQ, Australia, Vaccine hesitancy, risk perception, Behaviours, social science research, Community engagement, risk communication, vaccines, COVID-19