The California Department of Public Health is actively promoting the vaccine through radio stations across the state. L.A. County health officials also said Monday (May 10) that L.A. County will reach herd immunity by mid-July if the current rate of vaccine coverage is maintained. However, the percentage of health care professionals (HCWs) in the U.S. who are willing to be vaccinated against the CCA virus (COVID-19) is very low, according to a new preprinted study published in medRxiv in January 2021, cited by Medical Life Sciences News.
Only about one-third (36%) of HCWs surveyed said they would be willing to get the vaccine when it was available; while about 56% said they would rather wait and check safety data; and 8% said they would never get the vaccine, the report said. In the prefer to wait group, 10% said they would be willing to wait 3 months to 6 months, while 20% said they would be willing to wait at least a year. Geographically, the lowest willingness to vaccinate was among health care workers in the U.S. West, with only 33% willing to vaccinate; about half of health care workers in the U.S. South were willing to vaccinate; and only 26% of health care workers from rural areas were ready to vaccinate.
The report, published in medRxiv, is not peer-reviewed and therefore should not be considered conclusive and is not suitable for guiding clinical practice, among other things.
Survey participants were mostly young health care professionals
The survey participants were all 18 years of age or older who were working in one of the four categories of healthcare professionals, including direct medical providers (DMPs), direct care providers (DPCPs), advanced practice providers, and administrative staff who had little direct contact with patients. The survey asked questions including: perceptions of personal risk of COVID-19 infection; whether they have cared for COVID-19 patients; and whether they would be willing to receive the COVID-19 vaccine if possible, and possible reasons for not receiving the vaccine.
The survey was conducted between October and November of last year, and researchers received about 3,500 responses, with more than half of those who responded being younger than 40; 75% were female and more than 80% were white; 80% of them had a bachelor’s degree or higher; 44% said they were Democrats; and about 60% denied having any comorbidities. About two-thirds of them work in urban health care settings, and nearly 80% of them are direct care providers.
Nearly 90% of the providers believed they were at risk for COVID-19, but only 20% thought they would develop severe symptoms; and less than 10% were certain they would not become infected. Half of the participants believed that the choice of whether to get the vaccine should be left to the individual.
Over 80% of African-American and Aboriginal health care providers are reluctant to vaccinate
In terms of age distribution, only one-third of health care workers aged 18-30 were ready to be vaccinated, but nearly half of health care workers aged 70 and older were ready to be vaccinated. About 22% and 27% of health care workers, respectively, believe they are immune to the CCP virus and will not get it.
By gender, about 31% of female health care workers and about half of male health care workers agreed to be vaccinated.
By ethnicity, less than 20% of African-American healthcare workers chose to be vaccinated; up to 80% of Native Americans and 100% of Hawaiian or Pacific Islanders did not want to be vaccinated without more data review; 44% of Asian healthcare workers were ready to be vaccinated; and 30% of Hispanic or Latino healthcare workers were vaccinated.
By party affiliation, more than 40% of Democrats or left-leaning health care workers are ready to be vaccinated.
70% of healthcare professionals are concerned about the safety of vaccines
About 90% believe vaccination is generally safe and effective, but are more concerned about the COVID-19 vaccine; no personal or religious beliefs were cited as reasons for refusing the vaccine. Between 69% and 74% of health care providers said they were concerned about the safety of the COVID-19 vaccine, the vaccine’s side effects, efficacy, and the speed of development and approval of these vaccines. Nearly three-quarters of health care professionals said they trust the advice of medical professionals about COVID-19, but do not trust the information provided by the government about COVID-19 (73%) or its seriousness (46%). One-third of health care providers said they do not trust the regulation of government units such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the vaccine development process.
A notable observation is that direct care providers (i.e., DPCPs) were less likely to be willing to receive the vaccine, but they were more likely to have close or prolonged contact with patients and therefore be at higher risk of contracting the virus. The researchers believe that these health care providers are a critical force in the proper functioning of the health care system. As such, their health is critical to continue the response to the outbreak.
Also, Dr. Peter McCullough, a Dallas physician who testified before the Congressional Senate on Nov. 19, 2020, about the early therapeutic effects of hydroxychloroquine, recently raised concerns about the vaccine.
In an interview with the California Globe, McCullough said that according to the CDC’s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), 3,544 deaths and 12,619 serious injuries were reported in the system between Dec. 14 of last year and April 23 of this year. A similar situation with other vaccines would have been pulled from the market for safety reasons.
In an interview with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, McCullough said, “A typical new drug that has about five deaths and the cause is unknown, we get a black box warning. Your listeners will then see it on TV and say it could cause death.” “If there are 50 deaths, it (the new drug) will be taken off the market.” He also mentioned that during the 1976 swine flu epidemic, the U.S. planned to vaccinate 55 million Americans. But the program was discontinued when about 500 cases of paralysis and 25 deaths accumulated during the vaccine administration.
McCullough said the government and big companies are now focusing on vaccines, but early treatment is actually more important. McCullough testified before Congress that treating outpatients with early symptoms with hydroxychloroquine early in the outbreak would have gone a long way toward reducing the severity of the outbreak.
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