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. 2021 Aug 8;9(8):879.
doi: 10.3390/vaccines9080879.

Correlates of COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy among a Community Sample of African Americans Living in the Southern United States

Justin Xavier Moore  1   2   3 , Keon L Gilbert  4 , Katie L Lively  1 , Christian Laurent  1 , Rishab Chawla  1 , Cynthia Li  1 , Ryan Johnson  1 , Robert Petcu  1 , Mehul Mehra  1 , Antron Spooner  1 , Ravindra Kolhe  5 , Christy J W Ledford  6
Affiliations

Correlates of COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy among a Community Sample of African Americans Living in the Southern United States

Justin Xavier Moore et al. Vaccines (Basel). .

Abstract

In the United States, African Americans (AAs) have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19 mortality. However, AAs are more likely to be hesitant in receiving COVID-19 vaccinations when compared to non-Hispanic Whites. We examined factors associated with vaccine hesitancy among a predominant AA community sample. We performed a cross-sectional analysis on data collected from a convenience sample of 257 community-dwelling participants in the Central Savannah River Area from 5 December 2020, through 17 April 2021. Vaccine hesitancy was categorized as resistant, hesitant, and acceptant. We estimated relative odds of vaccine resistance and vaccine hesitancy using polytomous logistic regression models. Nearly one-third of the participants were either hesitant (n = 40, 15.6%) or resistant (n = 42, 16.3%) to receiving a COVID-19 vaccination. Vaccine-resistant participants were more likely to be younger and were more likely to have experienced housing insecurity due to COVID-19 when compared to both acceptant and hesitant participants, respectively. Age accounted for nearly 25% of the variation in vaccine resistance, with 21-fold increased odds (OR: 21.93, 95% CI: 8.97-5.26-91.43) of vaccine resistance in participants aged 18 to 29 compared to 50 and older adults. Housing insecurity accounted for 8% of the variation in vaccine resistance and was associated with 7-fold increased odds of vaccine resistance (AOR: 7.35, 95% CI: 1.99-27.10). In this sample, AAs under the age of 30 and those experiencing housing insecurity because of the COVID-19 pandemic were more likely to be resistant to receiving a free COVID-19 vaccination.

Keywords: COVID-19; disparities; race; vaccine acceptance.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Multivariable polytomous logistic regression for the association between select participant characteristics with being vaccine-resistant vs. acceptant, among 257 community participants within the SPARTA and 100 Black Men of Augusta survey by vaccine hesitancy groups.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Multivariable polytomous logistic regression for the association between select participant characteristics with being vaccine-hesitant vs. acceptant, among 257 community participants within the SPARTA and 100 Black Men of Augusta survey by vaccine hesitancy groups.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Results for R2 (presented as percentages) values for independently fit models and full model using the polytomous logistic regression, among 257 community participants within the SPARTA and 100 Black Men of Augusta survey by vaccine hesitancy groups.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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