Nov. 24 (UPI) — One in five adults, aged 50 to 80, would like to get vaccinated for COVID-19 right away, a new poll finds.
Another 46% would also like to get the COVID-19 vaccine, but first wait until others receive it, according to the National Poll On Healthy Aging from the University of Michigan published Tuesday.
Nearly half were also worried about the safety of a vaccine that is developed quickly.
Twenty percent were unsure about getting the vaccination, and 14% did not want to get vaccinated.
“Effective vaccines will be crucial to getting this pandemic under control and preventing serious illness and death from COVID-19, especially among people over 50 and people with underlying health issues,” the poll’s director, Preeti Malani, said in a press release.
The survey of 1,556 randomly selected people, age 50-80, was conducted online from Oct. 9-27, with support from AARP and Michigan Medicine.
Individuals age 65-80, men and Whites were more likely to say they wanted to get vaccinated for COVID-19 as soon as possible compared to age 50-64, women and Hispanics and Blacks, the poll found.
People who had underlying health conditions, higher household incomes or more education were also more likely to say they would get vaccinated right away, according to the poll.
Sixty-one percent said people who are high risk should be given priority in receiving the vaccine.
“Our findings point to a strong need to communicate effectively and transparently how well vaccines work, the safeguards built in to protect the safety of recipients, and the public health importance of widespread vaccination starting with priority groups,” said Malani, a specialist in geriatrics and infectious diseases at Michigan Medicine.
Since the pandemic began, COVID-19 has infected more than 12.4 million people in the United States and killed more than 257,000, according to Johns Hopkins University COVID-19 tracker.
Researchers project U.S. COVID-19 cases could reach 20 million before the end of January, a new model shows.
