Public opinion on coronavirus vaccination: Health Implications of Americans' surprisingly widespread acceptance of early Russian and Chinese vaccines

Abstract

In the US, new vaccines are banned until accepted as safe and effective by the FDA. But the approval process is slow and cautious. The faster, but perhaps riskier, Russian system (like the Chinese) produced an approved coronavirus vaccine months more quickly, leaving Americans at risk of dying for months longer than Russians. Despite widespread fears that many would be hesitant to accept vaccination at all, and understandable doubts about vaccine approval processes outside the US, data from two national surveys in September 2020 show, very surprisingly, that a majority of Americans at that time would have willingly taken the Russian vaccine. Moreover a two-to-one majority of Americans – rich and poor, young and old, Democrat and Republican alike – believed that they ought to be allowed to buy it. Based on those figures, we estimate that making the Russian vaccine (or the Chinese) immediately available would have saved 70 or more American lives each day in the autumn of 2020 and the beginning of 2021. To put that in context, US government prohibitions on Russian and Chinese vaccines cost more lives each day than the roughly 45 people killed daily by all American murderers combined. For the US government, a less authoritarian domestic policy, and a clearer appreciation of the globalization of medical technology, would seem to be indicated.