Willingness to vaccinate against COVID-19 in Australia

More than half of the world's population faces long-term restrictions as the new normal to prevent the spread of COVID-19. If a vaccine becomes available, it might be possible to develop herd immunity and protect those who are most vulnerable to serious consequences of COVID-19. The population coverage required to achieve herd immunity through vaccination varies across diseases and is dependent on the basic reproduction number (R0). Modelling estimates R0 to be around 2·5 for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus when no restrictions or physical distancing measures are in place, and R0 reached almost 4·0 in Wuhan in early-mid January, 2020. Vaccination uptake for herd immunity would need to be at least 67% with an R0 of 3·0. In their Comment, the COCONEL Group reported that 26% of French adults would not accept a COVID-19 vaccine. We similarly explored this question among a diverse sample of Australian adults.

We conducted an online survey of 4362 Australians aged 18 years and older during April 17–21, approximately 4 weeks after lockdown measures had been activated in Australia and at a time when potential deaths and health system capacity were still of great concern. We asked participants about actions or intentions toward the flu vaccine (“I have or I will get the flu vaccine this year”) and a potential COVID-19 vaccine (“If a COVID-19 vaccine becomes available, I will get it”).