COVID-19 among Czech Dentistry Students: Higher Vaccination and Lower Prevalence Compared to General Population Counterparts

Abstract

The restrictions on medical students’ clinical education during the COVID-19 pandemic has affected their professional readiness and often lengthened their training. These negative impacts are often considered a necessary price as clinical education is hypothesized to be associated with a high risk of pandemic spread. This work assesses this hypothesis based on COVID-19 epidemiological data among Czech dentistry students and their comparison to data of the Czech general population of similar age. We addressed two of the five Czech medical faculties (Charles University, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove and in Pilsen) providing dentistry study program with a survey. A total of 240 students participated, representing a 66.9% response rate. Over 75% of respondents participated in clinical education during the pandemic. The school environment was identified as a place of infection by only 9.8% of respondents who were aware of where they were infected. Overall, 100% of students used FFP2 respirators, and 75.3% used face shields or protective glasses while working with patients. By the end of May 2022, COVID-19 full vaccination and 1st booster rates among students were 93.8% and 54.6%, respectively, which is significantly higher (p < 0.0001, OR 7.3, 95% CI 4.4–12; p < 0.0001, OR 3.7, 95% CI 2.9–4.8, respectively) compared to their peers from the general population (67.1% and 24.4%, respectively). A total of 75.4% of respondents supported mandatory COVID-19 vaccination for healthcare professionals. To the same date, PCR and/or antigen test verified COVID-19 prevalence among students was 37.1%, while among peers from the general population, it was 45.1% (p = 0.015, OR 1.2, 95% CI 1.0–1.5). The combination of extensive protective measures and high vaccination against COVID-19 led to significantly lower COVID-19 prevalence among the students compared to their general population counterparts.

Healthcare Workers’ Attitudes towards Mandatory COVID-19 Vaccination: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“…Additionally, evidence from an Austrian study suggests that HCWs were equally divided about accepting COVID-19 vaccine mandates for the general population [38]. About a third of HCWs were in favor of mandatory vaccinations against COVID-19 in a study from Slovenia, while in a study conducted in the Czech Republic, HCWs supported mandatory COVID-19 vaccines for the general population [39,40]. All three included studies from Italy resulted in similar findings, reporting that most of HCWs supported mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations for the general population [41][42][43].…”

“…In the single included study from Cyprus, HCWs were divided on their attitudes towards COVID-19 vaccine mandates [32]. The last three studies from Europe (UK, Poland, and the Czech Republic) showed conflicting results regarding HCWs' acceptance of vaccine mandates for HCWs (acceptance rates: 6-75%) [37,40,57]. A generally supportive attitude was reported in a series of seven studies from the US, while data from two Australian studies revealed that Australian HCWs were divided about accepting COVID-19 vaccine mandates for HCWs [44][45][46][58][59][60][61][62][63].…”

“…Results of the meta-analysis. The pooled proportion (orange rhombus) of HCWs' acceptance of mandatory COVID-19 vaccines for HCWs was 64% (95% CI: 55%, 72%)[32,36,37,40,[43][44][45][46].…”

PCR TESTING FOR SARS-CoV-2 AMONG STUDENTS OF MEDICAL UNIVERSITY-PLEVEN DURING THE FOURTH WAVE OF COVID PANDEMIC

“…Of the participants in our study, 42% reported having been immunized, with the majority of them immunized with two doses. Despite the many questions that have arisen regarding vaccine safety, duration of immunity, and others, students at our university have achieved good immunization coverage, but compared to the students at other European universities, significantly lower [5]. Complete vaccination is essential to achieve a good protective effect.…”

“…At the same time, the medical students as a part of the population also were involved in the epidemiological process for transmission of the infection. There are few studies on the prevalence of COVID-19 among medical students [1][2][3][4]5]. Although, during the pandemic, new variants of SARS-CoV-2 have appeared and the severity of infection decreased, the high contagiousness of the virus and the increased risk for working medical professionals, including students training in medical specialties, still remain.…”