Vaccine Attitudes and COVID-19 Vaccine Intention Among Parents of Children With Kidney Disease or Primary Hypertension

Status of and perspectives on COVID-19 vaccination after lifting of the dynamic zero-COVID policy in China

“…At the same time, negative reports on adverse events without valid evidence continuously alter and distort the public perceptions of vaccine safety and efficacy and eventually lead to vaccine hesitancy or even vaccine refusal (41). Parents are skeptical of the vaccine development process and also afraid of adverse reactions, which may be overlooked in the rush to develop vaccines (42). Moreover, the fact that immunosuppressants may affect the immunogenicity of the vaccine played a role in whether parents allowed their children to be vaccinated (43).…”

“…The adolescents themselves believed that they had no risk of infection and that their symptoms would not be severe if they were infected (44). Adolescents with a history of immune-related diseases or other primary diseases in particular refused vaccination unless convincing evidence indicated clear benefits to them (42,44). Moreover, clinical trials on the COVID-19 vaccine for adolescents (younger than 18) are still lacking and real-time dissemination of information on vaccine efficacy among adolescents is still limited.…”

Pediatric Vaccine Hesitancy and COVID-19

“… 2 Determining the key drivers for vaccine hesitancy and current attitudes regarding COVID-19 vaccines are essential to combat misinformation and optimize vaccine uptake. Wang et al evaluated these attitudes in parents of children with a variety of kidney disorders at their center, 3 the results of which are published in this issue of AJKD . They found that a staggering two-thirds of parents were unwilling or unsure as to whether they would vaccinate their children against COVID-19.…”

“…Higher parental education was associated with an increased likelihood of COVID-19 vaccination, and themes of reasons for vaccine hesitancy included concerns about vaccine safety, variation in recommendations provided by health care professionals, and the need for more information. 3 …”

“…Generalizability of the study results to the parents of all children with kidney disease also comes into question, a limitation acknowledged by the authors. 3 Low participant numbers in groups classified by type of kidney disease or kidney replacement modality (dialysis and kidney transplant), along with the study being conducted at a single center and being survey-driven with a response rate of 39%, may not produce results that are representative of the pediatric nephrology community at large.…”