As COVID-19 vaccines come online, fewer Americans want to take them.National

Adults in the United States, regardless of age, race, or gender, are much less likely to be vaccinated in late November and early December than in early April. And while interest in the COVID-19 vaccine has diminished entirely, some groups of Americans want less vaccination than others.

Overall, 74.1% of US adults surveyed between April 1st and April 14th are “somewhat” or “very” likely to receive the COVID-19 vaccine when it becomes available. Said high. At that time, the country confirmed about 550,000 coronavirus infections, resulting in about 22,000 deaths, according to World Health Organization data.

Fast forward until the end of the year. Between November 25th and December 8th, 56.2% of adults in the United States still planned to be vaccinated when their turn came. Despite the fact that by the end of the study period, more than 14.5 million Americans had been infected and about 280,000 had died, according to the WHO.

Women are less likely to accept the vaccine than men. In recent weeks, only 50.6% said they plan to vaccinate, down from 69.5% in April. Men’s interest in vaccination dropped from 79.1% in spring to 62.3% eight months later.

When asked recently, 80.6% of Asian Americans said they would be vaccinated against COVID-19. Sounds a lot, but it was even higher in April — 90.9%.

No other racial or ethnic group is interested in the COVID-19 vaccine. Only 58.6% of White Americans surveyed in November and December said they would get one, along with 52.7% of Latin Americans (down from 73.1%) and only 37.6% of Black Americans (down from). (Decreased from 77.8% in April). 50.7%).

Enthusiasm for the COVID-19 vaccine increases with age, but it also diminishes over time. Americans over the age of 65 are still most enthusiastic about vaccination, with 69.1% of those recently surveyed saying they will be vaccinated. This is compared to 57% of people aged 50-64 and 50.9% of people aged 18-49.

Returning to April, 69.1% was the lower end of the spectrum. This was the percentage of people aged 18-49 who said they would be vaccinated. 76.7% of the 50-64 year olds and 83.8% of the elderly participated.

The study also looked at differences related to educational background. The authors found that the longer people spend at school, the more likely they are to want a vaccine.

In November and December, 70.3% of college graduates said they would be vaccinated as much as possible (down from 85% in April). On the other side of the spectrum, 47.6% of those with a high school diploma or lower were intended to be vaccinated (down from 67% in April).

The results are in favor of USC’s Understanding America Study, which asks members of the National Panel on issues related to COVID-19 every two weeks starting in March. Unlike other studies that measured American sentiment about the COVID-19 vaccine at any given time, this study tracks changes in the same group of more than 8,000 people since the early days of the pandemic. (Every two weeks, I answered questions in English or Spanish between 5,259 and 6,139.)

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration had not approved the COVID-19 vaccine by the time the previous study was completed, but early results from clinical trials indicate that Pfizer and BioN Tech and Moderna vaccine candidates are safe and highly It was suggested to be effective.

But even the good news couldn’t stop the decline of almost 18 percentage points in Americans’ willingness to vaccinate, the authors of the JAMA report lamented.

“We need an educational campaign to motivate the public to consider COVID-19 vaccination,” concluded a team of researchers from the USC, UCLA, and Los Angeles County Public Health Service.

“The low likelihood of receiving the COVID-19 vaccine among blacks and less educated people is of particular concern because of the disproportionate burden of COVID-19 disease,” they added.

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