Fight against hesitancy: public health concern towards COVID-19 vaccine.

A recent correspondence revealed that medical students are hesitant of receiving vaccines. Recent studies revealed that the hesitancy was seen among other age groups. However, this challenge does not impede medical workers as they continue to care for patients infected with the virus. With proper education and guidance, hesitancy and fear will be replaced by trust to fight coronavirus disease 2019.

Recent studies and articles have shown that coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine hesitancy is increasing across all age groups. In a recently published correspondence, it was argued that future healthcare professionals will be needing support and proper teaching so that they can better help the society in combatting the COVID-19 pandemic. Even medical students, who are among groups that are more likely to be exposed to COVID-19 patients, are hesitant of receiving vaccines. Thus, it is highly recommended that proper education be given about vaccines’ safety and efficacy to decrease the dilemma. A cross-sectional study revealed that 28.8% of the working-age group participants decided for an outright vaccine refusal, which is strongly associated with some mentioned factors such as lower educational level, poor compliance of previous vaccine recommendations and lower perceptions of COVID-19 severity.

The hesitancy in vaccination may be seen as a barrier among medical workers who handle and care for patients with COVID-19, since they are the ones with the highest risk of getting infected with the virus. Aside from safety and efficacy, it is essential to ‘educate, inform and intervene’ as stated. On another note, public trust in scientific research must be considered as it contributes to the citizen’s commitment to join the vaccination drive.

Having seen hesitancy in a vast majority of people, it is recommended that public health policies be restructured. Educating and informing people about the recent vaccine will gain people’s trust in fight against the pandemic.

Conflict of Interest

The author declares no conflict of interest in this paper.