Cape Town –An Ipsos survey conducted in partnership with the World Economic Forum points to a general uptick in Covid-19 vaccine intent across the world, compared to six weeks ago.
Vaccine intent in South Africa has changed since last August and will continue changing until a time that there is more certainty about the rollout of a vaccine, the market research company said.
The survey was conducted on Ipsos’ Global Advisor online platform between January 28 and 31, among adults in Canada, South Africa, Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Korea, Spain, the US and UK.
The UK currently shows the highest level of vaccination intent.
Nine in 10 British adults (89%) who say they have not yet been vaccinated against Covid-19 agree that they would get a vaccine if it were available.
At the time of the previous survey in December, the comparable figure stood at 77% in the UK.
“It seems as if the steady countrywide vaccination programme in this country over the last six weeks influenced vaccine intent very positively,” Ipsos said.
The percentage of those who “strongly agree” they will get vaccinated has increased in every country since the December survey.
The highest uptick in vaccine intent is seen in Italy and Spain by 28 percentage points to 54% who strongly agree in both countries, followed by the UK by 21 points to 67%, and Brazil and Mexico by 20 points in both countries to 72% and 62% respectively.
France follows with a rise by 19 points to 31%, China by 17 points to 44%, and Canada by 16 points to 55%.
Countries showing the smallest gains in the last six weeks in the proportion of the online population who “strongly agree” are Russia, by 3 points to 17%, Australia by 5 points to 43%, and South Africa by 6 points to 31%.
Strong feelings against being vaccinated were expressed in Russia, with 32% of people strongly disagreeing, with South Africa at 25% and France at 21%.
In nearly every one of the 15 countries, the two main reasons for Covid-19 vaccine hesitancy are concern about the side effects and the speed of the clinical trials.
In South Africa, about four in every 10 (39%) of those who are vaccine hesitant are worried about the possible side effects.
The worry that a vaccine was moving through clinical trials too fast was expressed by 33% of vaccine-hesitant South Africans.
The efficacy of the vaccine is questioned by 6% of vaccine-hesitant South Africans.
“This proportion might change after scientists established that the AstraZeneca vaccine is not very effective against the 501Y.V2 variant in South Africa,” Ipsos said.
Cape Times