Report article of survey on "Perception And Acceptance Of COVID-19 Vaccination In Pakistan"

This survey was conducted by Miss Sameen ansari on the topic "Perception And Acceptance Of COVID-19 Vaccination In Pakistan". Miss Sameen was facilitated by her team leads, Aymen Arif ( Program Manager at SBA), Hira Jamil ( Executive member at SBA) and Khalid Baloch (Founder,CEO & Trainer at SBA). 

Introduction:

COVID-19 pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2), was believed to have emerged from Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China in December 2019. On January 30, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared coronavirus outbreak as the sixth public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC),  and on March 11, 2020, WHO declared COVID-19 as a pandemic.[1] Until September 2021, this emergent disease has infected more than 225 million people globally and caused more than 4 million deaths. The pandemic continues to threaten the healthcare system with catastrophic economic, education, and social consequences worldwide [2,3]

COVID-19 is thought to be expanding in Pakistan. In Pakistan, the first case of COVID-19  was reported on February 26, 2020, in Karachi. Successively, the virus spreads into various regions nationwide and has currently become an epidemic. [4] Until mid of September 2021, Pakistan has reported 26,865 COVID-19 deaths or a 2.22 percent fatality rate out of 1,210,082 cases. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has imposed a heavy disease burden globally.  As immunization is one of the most successful and cost-effective health interventions to prevent infectious diseases, vaccines against COVID-19 are of great importance to prevent and control COVID-19. Countries worldwide are trying to accelerate the research and development of COVID-19 vaccines.[5] 

The future immunization against COVID-19 still has some problems, one of which is the public's doubt about the acceptability of COVID-19. Acceptance of vaccines represents the broad view that vaccine risk, vaccine attitudes, and demand among the general population are the main factors for the success of Vaccination Programs, especially newly emerging infectious illnesses, to achieve high vaccination coverage rates.[6][7][8] Reports on pandemic vaccination acceptability and uptake, like for the H1N1, 2009, have been dissatisfied, with surveys from Australia, the US, Greece, UK, and France showing readiness to get the 2009 H1N1 pandemic vaccine from the public being 17% to 67%.[9]Prior studies on vaccine acceptance and theories of health performance, such as the health belief model or protection motivation theory, have identified many factors that influence the acceptance or uptake of a pandemic vaccine, including the risk perception of the disease, insight of vaccine safety, and efficacy, overall vaccination attitude, past vaccination record, recommendations from doctors, price, vaccination suitability, and socio-demographic features.[10][11][12].

In addition to the problem of inadequate acceptance, the real uptake rate of COVID-19 epidemic vaccines could be much lower than the acceptance after the introduction of the vaccine and the promotion of mass immunization programs.[13][14][15][16] In recent reports, certain variables in vaccination acceptance have helped explain vaccination hesitancies and delay behaviors. Vaccine decision-making should also take into consideration the cultural, socioeconomic, or political variations between nations. For novel vaccines against new emerging pandemics, such as the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, public concern about vaccine safety was recurrently recognized as a solemn blockade to vaccine acceptance while attitudes and history regarding a vaccination especially influenza vaccination history were the chief predictors of pandemic vaccine uptake.[6][17][18][13] As the pandemic of COVID-19 is more severe compared to prior influenza pandemics in terms of transmissibility and death, nations all across the world, including China, are under severe pressure to manage the present pandemic and ensure a possible recurrence of harmful waves or epidemics.

Knowing the influencing variables for accepting vaccinations COVID-19 is essential in designing successful methods to enhance the overall population coverage of vaccines and identifying common obstacles and supports for the vaccination decisions.[8][19[[20][21]

The purpose of this study is to assess the acceptance of future vaccine COVID-19, vaccine characteristics preferences and immunization schedules, and the influence of vaccine acceptance among the Pakistani people. This knowledge is critical to prepare future COVID-19 immunization plans and initiatives.

 

Methodology:

This cross-sectional research followed a survey-based methodology. A questionnaire was designed, keeping into consideration the prevalent attitudes and beliefs of the  Pakistani public about COVID-19. An online survey was conducted in September 2021 for 2 weeks The information was used to gather the information regarding the perception and acceptance of covid-19 vaccination in Pakistan through a questionnaire. The sampling technique for the sample population was simple random sampling. The questionnaire was produced through google forms, which consist of several questions in accordance with the aims and objectives and designed in such a way to gain more data to conclude the results. The survey consists of 4 sections and a total of 18 questions, first section was basic demographic data which had 6 questions, the second section was about general information regarding covid-19 infection and vaccination which consisted of 5 questions, third section comprised of 4 agree/disagree questions for perceived susceptibility and barriers, and the last i.e., the fourth section consists of 3 checkbox questions. The questionnaire was approved by the SBA team after which it was shared via online platforms including Facebook, WhatsApp. The sharing was escalated by family members, friends, colleagues, and acquaintances. After two weeks of sharing the questionnaire, 90 responses were collected on basis of which concise observations and results were made. Quantitative data were subjected to descriptive statistical analysis. Content analysis, using a commercial software package, provided the framework for analyzing qualitative data whereby constantly recurring terms were identified, coded, categorized, and quantified.

 

Demographic Details of Respondents:

A total of 90 respondents participated in this online survey. Figures given below show the demographic characteristics, i.e., age, gender, educational level of the respondents who filled the online survey; age: the maximum number of people were between the age of 21–25 years; gender: 8.9% of males and 91.9% of females participated in the study; educational level: 50% of the respondents were undergraduate, 3.3% were postgraduates (i.e., MPhil and Ph.D.), 22.2% was bachelor degree holders, followed by master's degree holders (8.9%), 12.2% of the total respondents were intermediate students while 3.3%  had matric level education.

 

 

 

Attitude, Acceptance, and Perception of Covid-19 Vaccines:

 

Data of individual participants infected with Covid-19: 

 

The COVID-19 pandemic causes a huge global health crisis and impacts on large-scale behavior and attitude changes of the public. The survey consists of individuals’ data of getting infected with covid-19 and vaccinated against it. It is found that 44.4% of the participants are those who neither got infected with covid infection nor their family members suffered from covid-19. 17.8% of people have/had suspected symptoms of Covid-19 but didn’t verify with the doctor or through the covid test. While only a very little 3.3%of the whole respondents tested positive from covid but had no symptoms. 21.1% are those who tested positive with mild symptoms and 13.3% of the total individuals suspected it with severe symptoms. Out of those who suspected covid positive majority are those who got infected from it 1-3 months ago.

 

To know if the population had medical issues, a question was included regarding it, that showed 68.9% had no medical issues while 31.1% were suffering from different health issues such as allergies, asthma, hypertension, obesity, diabetes mellitus, sinus, PCOS, and claustrophobia. 

 

Individuals Status of Vaccination Against Covid-19:

Regarding the question that if the participant had taken or will take covid vaccination, the majority (40%) of the individuals had taken both doses, 27.8% had taken the first dose only, while 5.6% of the participants were not willing to get vaccinated against covid. On the other hand, 25.7% were those who haven't been vaccinated against covid-19 yet but might reconsider and get vaccinated in the future.

Preference of Covid-19 Vaccines:

The bar graph below shows that which covid vaccine they had taken/ will prefer to take against covid-19 infection. Out of 90 individuals 36.7% preferred Sinopharm, 30% had taken Sinovac, 11.1% preferred Pfizer, 12.2% preferred other covid vaccines while 10% were those who opted none.

 

Willingness to Get Vaccinated Against Covid-19:

The success of any vaccination program to achieve herd immunity depends on the vaccine acceptance and uptake rate. The herd immunity threshold depends on the basic reproduction number (R0). With the R0 of 2–3, no population immunity and that all individuals are equally susceptible and equally infectious, the herd immunity threshold for SARS-CoV-2 would be expected to range between 50% and 67% in the absence of any interventions. A question regarding the willingness to get Covid-19 vaccinated against covid added in the survey, as a binary variable grouping the answers as “strongly agree”; “agree”; “neither agree nor disagree”; “disagree”; and “strongly disagree”!. It was determined through the factors significantly associated with this response to check whether an individual intends to become vaccinated or still doubts or refuses to become vaccinated. The majority of the respondents 38.9% agree with this statement, while 31.1%  strongly agree with the vaccination against covid-19. On the other hand, 17.8% of individuals neither agree nor disagree with this question and, 12.2% of individuals denied getting vaccinated.

 

Natural v/s Induced Covid-19 Immunity:

The observations showed that almost 34.5% of the total respondents agree with the statement to acquire immunity against COVID-19 naturally (by having the disease/subclinical infection) rather than by vaccination. 32.2% of the total participants disagree with this statement, as they prefer vaccination over acquired immunity. The rest 33.3%  of the total individuals, neither agree nor disagree with the statement mentioned above.

 

Recommendation of Covid Vaccine to Others:

As to the fact that how many of the overall respondents suggest vaccination for others, it has been determined that 75.6 % recommend vaccination for their friends and families, while 12.2% would not recommend others to get vaccinated.

 

Attitude and Behavior Towards SOPs:

A statement on the conduct of people who were vaccinated against covid was added to the poll that they do not believe that preventative steps such as masking, sanitization, and social distance need to be followed taking the Covid-19 vaccine. Most respondents were not in support of this remark, i.e., 82.2 percent, as they consider that sops are equally necessary for controlling the spread of disease if vaccinated or not. 11.1% of people believe there is no need to take preventative precautions after being vaccinated.

 

It was found that the maximum number of participants (38.9%) believed that the Covid-19 vaccine would help in protecting them from the covid infection. 36.7% of participants think that covid-19 vaccination is a societal responsibility. About 34.4% think that there is no harm in taking the covid-19 vaccine. Few respondents (4.4%) took the covid vaccine because it was being enforced and due to societal pressure.

 

There are certain factors that might be responsible for creating doubt in mind regarding the Covid-19 vaccine that influences the decision of an individual whether to take the vaccine or not. It was analyzed through the responses that the majority (42.2%) have no concerns, as they have taken/will take the covid-19 vaccine. About 18.9% were concerned about unforeseen future effects of the covid vaccination, and 18.9% were worried about the serious side effects after taking the vaccination. 17.8% of participants think that the covid vaccine might be faulty or fake. 16% of the participants were concerned about the rapid development and approval of covid vaccination. 10% of participants think that the covid-19 vaccine is being promoted for commercial gains of pharmaceutical companies and 10% were concerned about the availability of the covid vaccine to themselves.

 

The participants were asked what else made them more inclined to take the covid-19 vaccination. 29% agreed with the assertion that everyone, regardless of wealth or ethnicity, would have equal access to the vaccination. 28.9 percent chose the option that once vaccinated they would be able to live their lives freely. About 26.7 percent of people believe they will be able to choose whether to receive the vaccination without consequences.

 

Conclusion:

This study provides early insight into the Pakistani population’s knowledge, acceptability and perception regarding COVID-19 vaccines. In summary, the findings of our survey suggest that the Pakistani residents of a relatively mediocre socioeconomic status, particularly men and students with a medical background, have appropriate practices and optimistic approaches due to the peak of a COVID-19 infection period. Different opinion lies among each gender regarding the perception of COVID-19. The education and health programs have aimed at improving the knowledge of the general population about COVID-19, and they are maintaining safe practices and optimism in people's attitudes.

 

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