[ad_1]
More than 6 in 10 Americans vaccinated now say they would get an additional COVID-19 booster if available to them, according to a new Yahoo News / YouGov poll.
The survey of 1,715 American adults, which was conducted July 13-15, found that 62 percent of those vaccinated would receive another vaccine if possible, while only 18 percent would decrease. Another 20 percent are unsure.
Emerging interest in COVID boosters comes as the hyper-contagious Delta variant results in a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” in one state after another, and the accelerated spread of the virus among unvaccinated Americans sometimes spills over into the vaccinated population in the form of “revolutionary cases.” “
While approved vaccines still provide almost complete protection against serious illness, hospitalization and death for Delta – more than 99% of people who have died from COVID this year were unvaccinated – the variant’s transmissibility and ability evading at least some immune defenses recently prompted Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, to announce that they would seek approval of a third dose from the Food and Drug Administration, even though U.S. officials and the World Organization for health claim that there is not enough evidence to prove that boosters are still needed.
Israel is distributing third doses of Pfizer vaccine to transplant recipients and other patients with weakened immune systems. Britain has announced a plan to give booster shots from September. Still, vaccine experts say it will be some time before most people need an extra dose.
“There is no evidence at this time that the general population needs a booster dose because we do not see any evidence of waning immunity or significantly reduced efficacy against the Delta variant,” William Moss, executive director of the International Vaccine Access Center at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Politico said. “I think for most people, outside of these special populations, the immunocompromised and maybe the elderly – I think most people’s immunity is going to last for years, to be honest.”
In asking interviewees, Yahoo News and YouGov noted that current information on the boosters is contradictory and inconclusive, and that “public health officials have yet to recommend them.” Almost two-thirds of Americans vaccinated still say they would get another dose.
This eagerness likely reflects growing concerns about Delta. Awareness of the variant has become almost universal, with 85% of Americans now saying they have heard of it (up from 73% four weeks ago) and 57% saying they are “very” or “a little” worried about it (versus 49 percent). Tellingly, more Americans now say they worry about Delta (again, 57%) than the coronavirus in general (50%).
But these concerns are not evenly distributed among the American population. In fact, vaccinated Americans (those with the least to fear from Delta) are much more worried about the variant than unvaccinated Americans (those with the most reason to worry).
While 85% of vaccinated Americans say Delta poses a “serious risk” to either “all Americans” (32%) or “unvaccinated Americans” (53%), for example, only half of unvaccinated Americans ( 50%) say the same thing, with only 17% specifying that it is the unvaccinated who are at risk. Meanwhile, 30% of unvaccinated people say Delta “poses no serious risk to Americans.”
Paradoxically therefore, 77% of vaccinated Americans worry about the spread of Delta, but only 51% of unvaccinated Americans share their concern. Likewise, just 18% of unvaccinated Americans say they plan to protect themselves against Delta and other variants by getting vaccinated in the future – less than a third of the proportion of vaccinated Americans who say they want one. additional layer of protection against a booster injection to be approved.
_________________________
The Yahoo News survey was conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample of 1,715 American adults surveyed online from July 13 to 15, 2021. This sample was weighted by gender, age, race, and education based on the American Community Survey, conducted by the United States Census Bureau, as well as the 2020 presidential vote (or no vote) and status of voter registration. Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel to be representative of all American adults. The margin of error is approximately 2.7%.
____
Learn more about Yahoo News:
[ad_2]
Source link