Suchergebnisse

AbstractAs COVID-19 vaccinations rolled out globally from late 2020, rules and recommendations regarding vaccine use in pregnancy shifted rapidly. Pre-registration COVID-19 vaccine trials excluded those who were pregnant. Initial Australian medical advice did not routinely recommend COVID-19 vaccines in pregnancy, due to limited safety data and little perceived risk of local transmission. Advice from local medical authorities changed throughout 2021, however, with recommendations and priority access during pregnancy. In Western Australia (WA), recommendations became requirements as the State government mandated vaccines for some workers, with brief availability of pregnancy exemptions. Through an examination of 10 in-depth interviews with WA pregnant women, we explore their decision-making and complex emotions regarding COVID-19 vaccinations, and how they balanced mandates, recommendations, and shifting considerations and perceptions of risk. Changing recommendations and rules—and media and popular interpretation and communications of these—led to confusion, including for medical professionals. Expectant parents had to negotiate the risks of COVID-19 disease, potential benefits and risks of vaccination, professional and personal costs of vaccine refusal, and interpret mixed medical advice. Our findings can inform the development and communication of public health policies and medical advice, and contribute to our understanding of bodily autonomy, risk, and decision-making beyond the pandemic.

AbstractAustralian governments have used vaccine mandates to drive high uptake of routine childhood vaccines and adult Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID‐19) and influenza vaccines. We sought to understand the attitudes of Western Australian parents regarding mandating COVID‐19 vaccines for children, interviewing 44 parents of children aged up to 18 years between May and December 2021. Transcripts were analysed to ascertain parents' attitudes and sources of reasoning. Over half of the parents supported COVID‐19 vaccine mandates for children, while the rest had opposing, nuanced or indifferent views. Participants invoked community and health‐related reasoning; policy and government‐related reasoning; and concerns based on practical implementation. There was a high degree of consistency in parents' attitudes toward COVID‐19 vaccines and whether they supported mandating them for children, although some who planned to delay vaccination nevertheless supported the idea of mandates. Some participants reported that a mandate would prompt them to vaccinate, but others were willing to accept the consequences of keeping their children unvaccinated, or said that a mandate would not affect them as they would vaccinate regardless. Understanding how parents think and feel about mandating COVID‐19 vaccines with educational exclusions or financial penalties is critical to inform policymakers, who may consider these strategies for future pandemic vaccines.