Poll: Health care workers as nervous as public to take coronavirus vaccine
Dec 14, 2020, 4:35 AM | Updated: 5:33 am
(AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
(AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
PHOENIX — With the initial shipments of the coronavirus vaccine expected to arrive in Arizona this week, health care workers will be among the first in line to receive the initial doses but not all are ready to roll up their sleeves.
Valley pollster OH Predictive Insights found health care workers are just as nervous about the coronavirus vaccine as the general public.
Much like a poll of Arizonans in September, 37% of those workers would not roll up their sleeves and 8% were undecided.
Arizona Department of Health Services Director Dr. Cara Christ was more optimistic during a press conference on Friday .
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“The survey was promising,” Christ said. “It identified that 55% of health care providers were likely to get the COVID vaccine, based on what they knew right then.”
Christ said health care workers need just as much information and confidence as the general public.
“We will be working with our health care providers as well as our local community partners to ensure that we get as much vaccination going as possible,” Christ said.
She figured 70% of Arizonans would need the vaccine to achieve herd immunity. Chirst said that would take effect less than a week after a person receives the second dose of the vaccine.
She said she expects at least 384,000 doses will arrive in Arizona before Dec. 31, and the same amount of second doses in January.
If health care workers and first responders, who make up the tier 1-A priority group, don’t want the vaccines, then Christ says vaccinators will immediately book teachers and other essential workers for appointments.
