Background Bosnia and Herzegovina is among ten countries in the world with the highest mortality rate due to COVID-19. Lack of lockdown, open borders, high mortality rate, no vaccination plan, and strong domestic anti-vaccination movement present serious COVID-19 concerns in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In such circumstances, we set out to study 1) the willingness of general public to receive the vaccine, 2) factors that affect vaccine rejection, and 3) motivation for vaccine acceptance. Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted among 10471 adults in Bosnia and Herzegovina to assess the acceptance or rejection of participants toward COVID-19 vaccination. Using a logistic regression model, we examined the associations of sociodemographic characteristics with vaccine rejection, reasons for vaccine hesitancy, preferred vaccine manufacturer, and information sources. Results Surprisingly, only 25.7% of respondents indicated they would like to get a COVID-19 vaccine, while 74.3% of respondents were either hesitant or completely rejected vaccination. The vaccine acceptance increased with increasing age, education, and income level. Major motivation of pro-vaccination behavior was intention to achieve collective immunity (30.1%), while the leading incentive for vaccine refusal was deficiency of clinical data (30.2%). The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is shown to be eightfold more preferred vaccine compared to the other manufacturers. For the first time in Bosnia, vaccine acceptance among health care professionals has been reported, where only 39.4% of healthcare professionals expressed willingness to get vaccinated. Conclusion With the high share of the population unwilling to vaccinate, governmental impotence in securing the vaccines supplies, combined with the lack of any lockdown measures suggests that Bosnia and Herzegovina is unlikely to put COVID-19 pandemic under control in near future.

Objective: To provide relevant insight into the current degree of usage of the research potential of students of biomedical sciences in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Method: The chosen data collection method was online surveying via Google search engine. The target group were students of biomedical sciences in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The surveying was conducted in July 2019, and responses were subjected to descriptive statistics. Results: Although the majority of participants claimed that they were familiar with the seminar and scientific papers writing methodology and that the related course is available in their faculty’s curriculum, the quality of such courses may be questioned as the majority of study participants self-reported that they do not possess or did not posses necessary knowledge for writing and publishing a scientific paper. Also, the majority of respondents reported that they have never participated in any scientific research, which questions the involvement of students in scientific research in our country as well. More than half of respondents were actively reading scientific papers, but a third of them did not have that habit. Two-thirds of students reported that they have never attended any scientific event where they could learn more about the scientific research methods. Inadequate awareness of the importance of research, lack of students’ interest in making a research, and lack of knowledge were characterized as main obstacles in conducting scientific research according to survey responses. Conclusion: Information obtained through research indicate that the student potential in scientific research in Bosnia and Herzegovina has not been used in its maximal capacity, requiring several steps to be taken towards its improvement.

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Bosnia and Herzegovina is among ten countries in the world with the highest mortality rate due to COVID-19 infection. Lack of lockdown, open borders, high mortality rate, no herd immunity, no vaccination plan, and strong domestic anti-vaccination movement present serious COVID-19 concerns in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In such circumstances, we set out to study if the population is willing to receive the vaccine. A cross-sectional study was conducted among 10,471 adults in Bosnia and Herzegovina to assess the attitude of participants toward COVID-19 vaccination. Using a logistic regression model, we assessed the associations of sociodemographic characteristics with vaccine rejection, reasons for vaccine hesitancy, preferred vaccine manufacturer, and information sources. Surprisingly, only 25.7% of respondents indicated they would like to get a COVID-19 vaccine, while 74.3% of respondents were either hesitant or completely rejected vaccination. The vaccine acceptance increased with increasing age, education, and income level. Major motivation of pro-vaccination behaviour was intention to achieve collective immunity (30.1%), while the leading incentive for vaccine refusal was deficiency of clinical data (30.2%). The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is shown to be eightfold more preferred vaccine compared to the other manufacturers. For the first time, vaccine acceptance among health care professionals has been reported, where only 39.4% of healthcare professionals expressed willingness to get vaccinated. With the high share of the population unwilling to vaccinate, governmental impotence in securing the vaccines supplies, combined with the lack of any lockdown measures suggests that Bosnia and Herzegovina is unlikely to put COVID-19 pandemic under control in near future.