Public may refuse pandemic vaccine over safety concerns

Parents and health care workers may refuse to get immunized or vaccinate their children against a pandemic virus if they believe the risks of a novel vaccine outweigh the benefits, according to research published in Emerging Health Threats Journal ( http://dx/doi.org/10.1034/ehtj.09.008).

As the influenza A(H1N1) pandemic threatens to pick up speed as winter approaches in the northern hemisphere, pharmaceutical companies are racing to produce a vaccine against the novel 'swine flu' virus. The first batches of vaccine could be used to protect vulnerable populations as well as to ensure the pandemic does not compromise health care availability. But immunisation in communities is most effective when enough people are vaccinated to confer 'herd immunity' on the rest of the population. Members of the public who refuse the jab for themselves or their children could compromise this wider protective effect, the researchers say.

The researchers, Natalie Henrich of the University of British Columbia and Bev Holmes at Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada, conducted eleven focus groups in Vancouver before the onset of the current pandemic, and asked participants how willing they would be to accept a new vaccine in the event of a pandemic.