More than a quarter of unvaccinated Americans believe COVID-19 vaccines pose a greater risk to their health than the virus itself, a new poll finds.
In the survey, conducted by Yahoo News/YouGov, more than one-third said the virus that causes COVID-19 is the greatest threat in the U.S.
However, 28 percent of adults who haven’t received their shots say the immunizations are risker.
There are currently no data to suggest that any of the available vaccines in the U.S. are a greater risk to the country than the virus, known as SARS-CoV-2.
It comes as heath officials say the COVID-19 outbreak is becoming the ‘pandemic of the unvaccinated’ and nearly all cases, hospitalizations and deaths are currently in unvaccinated individuals amid the spread of the Indian ‘Delta’ variant.
A new poll found that 37% of unvaccinated adults said the virus that causes COVID-19 is the greatest threat to the U.S. and 28% said the vaccines pose a greater risk to their health
It comes as the Delta variant continue to spread but only 15% of unvaccinated adults said the variant makes them more likely to get vaccinated. Pictured: Anti- vaccination activists protest the proof of vaccination requirement to get into the Foo Fighters show as Madison Square Garden reopening, March 2020
For the poll, 1,715 U.S. adults were surveyed online between July 13 and July 15, with the sample weighted according to sex, age, race and education.
In total, 37 percent of unvaccinated over-18s said that the virus was the greatest threat to the U.S.
However, 28 percent said the vaccines pose a greater risk to their health than the virus while 35 percent said they were unsure.
This was in stark comparison with vaccinated Americans of whom 83 percent said the virus was the great risk to the general public.
Just five percent of fully immunized adults said vaccines were the greater threat and 12 percent said they were unsure. a greater risk to their health, more unvaccinated
The survey did not ask why individuals believed vaccines were a greater threat but it could be due to misinformation.
A May poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation found that two-thirds of unvaccinated adults believe or are unsure about vaccine myths including that the vaccines cause COVID-19, lead to infertility or alter DNA.
None of these theories are true.
Last week, in his first advisory serving under the Biden administration, which released on Thursday, U.S. Surgeon General Dr Vivek Murthy said that COVID-19 misinformation is an ‘urgent threat’ to public health.
He added that false information about COVID-19 – and the vaccines to combat it – put ‘lives at risk.’
‘Health misinformation is an urgent threat to public health. It can cause confusion, sow mistrust, and undermine public health efforts, including our ongoing work to end the COVID-19 pandemic,’ Murthy said in a statement.
‘As Surgeon General, my job is to help people stay safe and healthy, and without limiting the spread of health misinformation, American lives are at risk…tackling this challenge will require an all-of-society approach, but it is critical for the long-term health of our nation.’
It comes as the Delta variant continues to spread across the U.S.
In testimony before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee on Wednesday, Dr Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said the variant accounts for 83 percent of COVID-19 cases.
The figure is a considerable increase from the 50 percent of infections that were linked to the Delta variant two weeks ago.
The highly contagious variant is why more than 90 percent of all new infections are among unvaccinated people, and why as many as 99 percent of hospitalizations and deaths are among the unvaccinated.
Yet the variant does not seem to be changing most unvaccinated people’ minds.
Just 15 percent of adults surveyed who have not received their shots said they were more likely to get vaccinated.
Another 73 percent said the variant made no difference in their decision to get vaccinated and 12 percent even said they
Source link : https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-9807125/More-quarter-unvaccinated-Americans-say-COVID-19-shots-pose-greater-risk-virus.html
