Date of Conferral

3-14-2024

Date of Award

March 2024

Degree

Ph.D.

School

Public Health

Advisor

Jennifer Oliphant

Abstract

Vaccine hesitancy is a major global health problem despite their being historically effective at preventing infectious diseases such as tetanus, diphtheria, polio, rabies, pertussis, measles, and yellow fever. It has significantly hampered herd immunity, with a rate of 67% for COVID-19 globally. Vaccine hesitancy is common in underdeveloped nations like Nigeria. Misinformation and rumors may be the foundation of the lower vaccination rates in impacted African nations, particularly Nigeria. Thus, the Nigerian population has primarily remained unvaccinated or hesitant about COVID-19 vaccination uptake. This qualitative study explored the knowledge and attitudes towards hesitancy regarding COVID-19 vaccination uptake in Nigeria. The health belief model guided the study. Purposive and snowballing sampling strategies were used to select 18 participants ages 18 to 60 years who were unvaccinated from across Nigeria. NVivo qualitative data analysis software was used to analyze the data collected. The study findings suggest that the participants' attitude towards hesitancy to COVID-19 vaccination uptake remains unchanged, indicating persistent low uptake of COVID-19 vaccine among the population. Implications for positive social change include encouraging collaboration between policy actors in health management. Working with stakeholders and the community, this health team can create social awareness through trusted social media networks and health centers and have transparent scientific data readily available to the community for verification to rekindle trust in vaccine programs in Nigeria.

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