"If it wasn't forced upon me, I would have given it a second thought": Understanding COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in an outlier county in the Bay Area, California.

Publisher: Public Library of Science Country of Publication: United States NLM ID: 101285081 Publication Model: eCollection Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1932-6203 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 19326203 NLM ISO Abbreviation: PLoS One Subsets: MEDLINE

Original Publication: San Francisco, CA : Public Library of Science

COVID-19*/epidemiology ; COVID-19*/prevention & control; Adult ; Humans ; COVID-19 Vaccines ; California ; Emotions ; Pandemics ; Vaccination

While the San Francisco Bay Area counties rank very low in vaccine hesitancy and high in vaccination rates when compared to national numbers, Solano County has the most residents who are hesitant (6.3%) and the least who are fully vaccinated (51.6%) among Bay Area counties, according to the CDC. No studies to date have been able to provide the in-depth, localized information that would inform county-level public health interventions. This study aims to explore reasons and consequences for remaining unvaccinated in Solano County. Using a qualitative in-depth interview approach, we conducted 32 interviews with unvaccinated adults from Solano County. We used a grounded theory approach to our analysis. Using the socio-ecological model as a framework, we found that reasons for not getting vaccinated were primarily structural (mistrust of public information) and individual (bodily autonomy, personal choice) while consequences were primarily interpersonal (discrimination and stigma from friends, family, and employers). An overarching theme was that the vaccine rollout and messaging felt like an encroachment on personal choice and the feeling of being forced created more mistrust. Participants reported feeling like their decisions made them minorities among their colleagues, friends and family and that they were not persuaded by groupthink or by their relationships. Future public health responses to epidemics and pandemics might consider if a vaccine mandate is the best approach for reaching all county residents.
Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
(Copyright: © 2023 Brody et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.)

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0 (COVID-19 Vaccines)

Date Created: 20231221 Date Completed: 20231225 Latest Revision: 20231225

20231225

PMC10735040

10.1371/journal.pone.0290469

38127963