The negative impact of misinformation and vaccine conspiracy on COVID-19 vaccine uptake and attitudes among the general public in Iraq

•A majority of participants held at least a slight belief in vaccine misinformation.•Positive attitude towards vaccination was linked with disbelief in vaccine conspiracy.•Endorsing vaccine misinformation was linked with negative attitude to vaccination. Vaccine hesitancy is a major barrier to infec...

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Veröffentlicht in:Preventive medicine reports 2024-07, Vol.43, p.102791, Article 102791
Hauptverfasser: Sallam, Malik, Kareem, Nariman, Alkurtas, Mohammed
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Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:•A majority of participants held at least a slight belief in vaccine misinformation.•Positive attitude towards vaccination was linked with disbelief in vaccine conspiracy.•Endorsing vaccine misinformation was linked with negative attitude to vaccination. Vaccine hesitancy is a major barrier to infectious disease control. Previous studies showed high rates of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in the Middle East. The current study aimed to investigate the attitudes towards COVID-19 vaccination and COVID-19 vaccine uptake among adult population in Iraq. This self-administered survey-based study was conducted in August–September 2022. The survey instrument assessed participants’ demographics, attitudes to COVID-19 vaccination, beliefs in COVID-19 misinformation, vaccine conspiracy beliefs, and sources of information regarding the vaccine. The study sample comprised a total of 2544 individuals, with the majority reporting the uptake of at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccination (n = 2226, 87.5 %). Positive attitudes towards COVID-19 vaccination were expressed by the majority of participants (n = 1966, 77.3 %), while neutral and negative attitudes were expressed by 345 (13.6 %) and 233 (9.2 %) participants, respectively. Factors associated with positive attitudes towards COVID-19 vaccination in multivariate analysis included disbelief in COVID-19 misinformation and disagreement with vaccine conspiracies. Higher COVID-19 vaccine uptake was significantly associated with previous history of COVID-19 infection, higher income, residence outside the Capital, disbelief in COVID-19 misinformation, disagreement with vaccine conspiracies, and reliance on reputable information sources. COVID-19 vaccine coverage was high among the participants, with a majority having positive attitudes towards COVID-19 vaccination. Disbelief in COVID-19 misinformation and disagreement with vaccine conspiracies were correlated with positive vaccine attitudes and higher vaccine uptake. These insights can inform targeted interventions to enhance vaccination campaigns.
ISSN:2211-3355
2211-3355
DOI:10.1016/j.pmedr.2024.102791