Likelihood of COVID-19 vaccination among primary school students in Hong Kong

Abstract

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Why do Hong Kong parents have low intention to vaccinate their children against COVID-19? testing health belief model and theory of planned behavior in a large-scale survey

“…The low levels of intention were in contrast to the findings from other countries [4] , [5] , [15] ; Feng et al, 2020; [22] , [32] , [33] ,Yoda & Katsuyama, 2021; [38] , [41] but consistent with an earlier, smaller-scale study conducted in Hong Kong parents [23] . We speculate that possible reasons to explain this low intention could be due to insufficient scientific information about the safety and efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines in children, perception of relatively low severity of the pandemic in Hong Kong compared to other societies, possession of the belief that symptoms are not severe in children even if they are infected compared to adults, and low willingness to risk their children’s lives for receiving the vaccines because of the potential side effects.…”

“…Parents’ intention to vaccinate their children against COVID-19 was measured with a single item “Without any policy restrictions, I will arrange this child to take COVID-19 vaccines” on a five-point Likert scale (from “1 = strongly disagree ” to “5 = strongly agree ”). This item was constructed on the basis of a recent study about parents’ intention to take their children for COVID-19 vaccination in Hong Kong [23] . In this item parents were asked to report their intention toward each of their children aged 5-12 if they had more than one child within this age range.…”

“…The announcement triggered fierce debates among parents. A preliminary study conducted in early 2021 based on a small sample of Hong Kong parents ( N = 349) found that only 21.2% of parents would vaccinate their primary school children if COVID-19 vaccines were officially authorized for use in children [23] ). This rate ranks almost the lowest among the existing findings from Australia [15] , Brazil [5] , Canada [22] , Japan (Yoda & Katsuyama, 2021), Latin America and the Caribbean [38] , mainland China (Feng et al, 2020; [41] , Poland [4] , and the US [32] , [33] .…”

A-One Health Approach on the Evaluation of COVID-19 Risk Perception and Factors Associated with the COVID-19 Vaccine Acceptance in Nigeria, West Africa

“…Compared with the general population (in this case, NHCWs), HCWs had more willingness to be vaccinated against COVID-19, as recorded in our study. Similar trends were reported in a regional survey involving six Asia-Paci c countries, including Bhutan, China, India, Indonesia, Singapore and Vietnam [48], as well as other separate studies in India [19], Canada [49], Hong Kong [50], France [51,52], and the USA [53]. The most important and independent factors often associated with COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among HCWs include concerns regarding risks and safety [52].…”

Recommending COVID-19 Vaccines to Patients: Practice and Concerns of Frontline Family Doctors

“…There could be differences in the factors associated with vaccination recommendation between respondents and non-respondents that might have introduced bias. Nevertheless, the response rate is comparable to, or slightly better than, other online surveys conducted overseas among doctors [17], or locally among doctors [19] or general public [20].…”