As first doses of the coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine begin to arrive in states across the country, many Americans are unsure about whether they’ll get vaccinated.
One quarter of adults in the United States are still on the fence about whether they’ll receive the vaccine and nearly another quarter said they won’t get vaccinated, according to a poll conducted by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
Most people cited side effects from the vaccine as the reason for not wanting to be vaccinated. Nearly half of poll participants, 47%, said they were worried about getting COVID-19 from the vaccine.
“I think there’s been such an intensive worldwide effort to create this vaccine and so much scrutiny to make sure it’s done right. They wouldn’t allow a vaccine to move forward if they didn’t have confidence in it and it’s been approved at multiple levels,” Mayor Bill de Blasio previously said when asked about people’s reluctance to get the vaccine.
Approximately 6 million doses of the vaccine are expected to be made available nationwide, with the federal government distributing it to the state via the military and private delivery companies like FedEx.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo and de Blasio said vaccines will begin arriving in New York state and city this weekend and into next week.
New York expects to receive approximately 170,000 doses of the vaccine from the first shipment, which will be prioritized for nursing home residents, staff and high-risk hospital workers.
New York City is expected to receive about 72,000 of the 170,000 doses.
According to the poll, 62% of adults aged 60 and older said they would get vaccinated compared to 51% of people aged 45 to 59 and 36% of people under age 45.
Overall, 47% of adults said they would get vaccinated, the results show.
Epidemiologists, virologists and others in the field have estimated that at least 70% of the population in the United States needs to be vaccinated to reach herd immunity, which is the point at which enough people have been vaccinated and are protected from the virus that it is not a large-scale threat.
Less than half of the people polled, three out of 10, said they are extremely confident in the vaccine’s effectiveness and safety, according to the poll, which also said about the same number of people said they aren’t confident in its safety and effectiveness.
According to a new data report released by the Food and Drug Administration, the vaccine begins providing protection against the virus after just 10 days of the first dose.
The two-dose vaccine has an efficacy rate of 95% after receiving both doses three weeks apart, according to Pfizer and BioNTech, however, “strong protection” has been noted 10 days after the initial dose.
According to data from the trials, many participants experienced minor side effects such as fevers and aches, but no serious adverse side effects have been reported.
Pfizer data did reveal that many patients felt ill shortly after receiving the second dose of the vaccine, however, symptoms did not last long.
___
(c) 2020 Staten Island Advance
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
