TY - JOUR
AU - Amjad, Zara
AU - Maryam, Iqra
AU - Munir, Maria
AU - Salman, Muhammad
AU - Baraka, Mohamed A.
AU - Mustafa, Zia Ul
AU - Khan, Yusra Habib
AU - Mallhi, Tauqeer Hussain
AU - Hasan, Syed Shahzad
AU - Meyer, Johanna C.
AU - Godman, Brian
PY - 2023
DA - April
TI - Covid-19 vaccines status, acceptance and hesitancy among maintenance hemodialysis patients : a cross-sectional study and the implications for Pakistan and beyond
JO - Vaccines
VL - 11
IS - 5
DO - https://doi.org/10.3390/vaccines11050904 10.3390/vaccines11050904
AB - COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy continues to be a widespread problem in Pakistan due to various conspiracy beliefs, myths and misconceptions. Since the hemodialysis population is at higher risk of contracting infections, we sought to investigate the current COVID-19 immunization status and reasons for any vaccine hesitancy among these patients in Pakistan. This cross-sectional study was conducted among maintenance hemodialysis patients at six hospitals of Punjab Province of Pakistan. Data were collected anonymously using a questionnaire. 399 hemodialysis patients took part in the survey, the majority of them were male (56%) and aged 45 – 64 years. 62.4% of the patients reported receiving at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine. Of those vaccinated (249), 73.5% had received two dose and 16.9% had received a booster dose. The most common reasons for vaccination were “being aware they were at high risk” (89.6%), “fear of getting infected” (89.2%) and “willingness to fight against COVID-19 pandemic” (83.9%). Of the 150 patients who had not yet been vaccinated, only 10 showed willingness to take the COVID-19 vaccine. The major reasons for refusal included “COVID-19 is not a real problem” (75%), “corona vaccine is a con-spiracy (72.1%)” and “I don’t need the vaccine” (60.7%). Our study revealed that only 62% pa-tients receiving hemodialysis were partially or completely vaccinated against COVID-19. Con-sequently, there is a need to initiate aggressive approaches to educate this high-risk population in order to address their vaccine safety and efficacy concerns and correct current myths and mis-conceptions to improve the COVID-19 immunization status in this population.
PB - MDPI
UR - https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/85308/
KW - Coronavirus (COVID-19)
ER