Study finds 6.5% of Spanish population refused COVID-19 vaccination

Europe is experiencing an more and more massive circulation of influenza and the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Along with COVID-19, these viruses are anticipated to have a serious impression on well being companies and populations this winter. This reveals the significance of weak teams being vaccinated in opposition to influenza and COVID-19, and of everybody defending themselves and others in opposition to infections.

One of many difficulties is individuals’s reluctance to be vaccinated. A research performed by researchers on the UOC revealed in open entry within the scientific journal PLOS ONE has assessed reluctance to obtain the vaccine in opposition to COVID-19 in Spain throughout the spring-autumn marketing campaign of 2021, amongst each the final inhabitants and well being care professionals, and gives info on the best way to overcome it.

“The purpose of this research was to create an correct and dependable portrait of a selected time limit, when the primary vaccination marketing campaign in opposition to COVID-19 befell, to find out what might be improved sooner or later,” stated Salvador Macip i Maresma, a physician and professor within the School of Well being Sciences on the UOC, and the analysis director of the Mechanisms of Most cancers and Ageing Laboratory on the College of Leicester.

Macip participated on this research led by Francesc Saigi Rubió, a researcher on the eHealth Heart and the director of the World Well being Group (WHO) Collaborating Heart in eHealth on the UOC, Hans Eguia, a Ph.D. scholar within the UOC’s School of Well being Sciences and professor within the School of Psychology and Training Sciences and Marina Bosque, researcher within the UOC’s eHealth Heart.

An setting of doubt and suspicion

A mass vaccination marketing campaign for the final inhabitants was launched in Europe in spring 2021 to fight the pandemic attributable to COVID-19. The seriousness of the illness, the velocity at which the varied vaccines grew to become out there and mistrust of pharmaceutical laboratories created an setting of doubt and suspicion surrounding the brand new drugs and their widespread utility, which led to vaccines being rejected by hundreds of individuals.

Social media had been crammed with hoaxes, false info and pretend information geared toward creating an environment of mistrust in the direction of the vaccines and the brand new strategies that had been used to fabricate them, resembling messenger RNA know-how. Some even deemed remoted instances, such because the blood clots supposedly attributable to inoculation with the sort of vaccine, to be a normal rule.

Vaccination hesitancy

Through the research, the specialists surveyed greater than 4,300 individuals via social media, together with 500 well being care professionals working in varied branches of drugs, within the spring of 2021. At the moment, 48.6% of the individuals from the final inhabitants had been vaccinated in opposition to COVID-19, and 6.5% of the final inhabitants reported hesitancy at receiving the vaccination. Nevertheless, the older the respondents, the upper the proportion of people that had been vaccinated.

“The youngest and people with the bottom ranges of schooling had been probably the most reluctant to be vaccinated. This was most likely as a result of they had been the social group that perceived the least threat of experiencing issues associated to COVID-19, in order that they noticed the vaccine as having fewer advantages,” identified the professional, who emphasised that greater ranges of schooling and having medical data “reduces hesitancy” towards these progressive medicines.

In the meantime, 95% of the well being care professionals collaborating had been vaccinated in opposition to COVID-19. “The well being care professionals had extra doubts about whether or not the vaccine was efficient and secure. However they had been the least reluctant to be vaccinated. This was probably as a result of they’d a greater understanding of the results of not being vaccinated, and had been extra aware of the final idea behind a vaccine,” famous Macip.

One other of the features that the research thought of was a vaccine’s acceptance or rejection relying on which laboratory had manufactured it. On this space, most individuals confirmed no desire for any specific vaccine. Nevertheless, individuals who had been vaccinated with the Pfizer vaccine stated they’d obtained their “most popular vaccine.”

In Europe, because of the campaigns that had been carried out, there was a desire for vaccines based mostly on mRNA (messenger RNA) fairly than the opposite sorts of vaccine that had been out there to the inhabitants at the moment. “Acceptance of vaccination in opposition to the coronavirus was not affected by the anti-vaccine actions or by the misinformation in some media,” stated the specialists in regards to the setting that was obvious at the moment throughout the pandemic.

Data to enhance belief in vaccines

Though these information are usually not notably unfavourable, a major share of the inhabitants nonetheless rejects the sort of vaccine. This group might endanger their very own well-being and even create a public well being downside. “Ignorance is what creates probably the most hesitancy. However good info may even overcome the attraction that anti-vaxxers create in social media,” stated the researcher.

In truth, in keeping with the World Well being Group, vaccine hesitancy was a “widespread” downside even earlier than the pandemic, and is taken into account one of many ten most important threats to world well being.

In an effort to overcome it, specialists stress that correct, confirmed, clear and well timed info is the best technique to lift public consciousness and to reduce rejection and hesitancy in the direction of the sort of drugs. The advantages are obvious, as when vaccination campaigns are carried out, hesitancy and rejection decline as their performance and effectiveness are understood. “Data campaigns are important. The extra individuals learn about a brand new drug, the much less they concern it,” Macip concluded.

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Universitat Oberta de Catalunya