Vaccine safety messages during the pandemic may have helped with vax hesitancy in PNG

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2022-11-18 06:00

Australia; Pacific; International; ACT

Image by torstensimon from Pixabay

Vaccine safety messages during the COVID-19 pandemic may have helped with vaccine hesitancy in Papua New Guinea, where vaccination rates are relatively low, according to Aussie research. The team conducted a large phone and online survey of over 2,000 people, with randomly assigned participants also receiving a message about the safety of vaccines. The team found that less than 20% of respondents to the phone survey were willing to be vaccinated because of a fear of side effects and low trust in the vaccine. The online survey found that participants who received a message about the safety of the vaccines were 68% more likely to state that they planned to get vaccinated than those who did not receive the message.

Media release

From:

Journal/
conference: PLOS ONE

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: The Australian National University

Funder: Funding for this study was provided by Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance; the Korea Trust Fund for Economic and Peace-Building Transitions; and The United States Agency for International Development (through the Papua New Guinea UNICEF office). The funders played no role in the the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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