Young people and white adults are the most vaccine-hesitant groups in SA.

This is according to the University of Johannesburg/ Human Sciences Research  Council  Covid-19 democracy  survey which released two reports on Wednesday. Three surveys have been completed since April 2020, with this one, the fourth, focused on 8,000 people of all races, ages and socio-economic groups between the period of  June 25 2021 to  July 20 2021. 

“White adults have bucked the main trend, becoming more hesitant, and their acceptance rate is now only a little more than half,” read the report.

The report is released in the wake of a drop in the number of people getting vaccinated and the government ramping up efforts to encourage particularly men to get jabs.

Health minister Joe Phaahla has called on more men to register for a Covid-19 vaccine — a higher percentage of women having been inoculated.

The report found that men are actually less hesitant to get the vaccine than women but are slow to go get vaccinated, with 74%  of men being vaccine positive compared to 70%  of women.

“For both men and women, vaccine acceptance increased by 5 percentage points between rounds three and four. However, there is a perplexing gendered contrast between willingness to vaccinate and actual vaccination,” read the report.

Prof Kate Alexander said although they are seeing worrying trends, their data showed 72% of South Africans are vaccine accepting.

“What we are terming the acceptance rate includes those who have got the vaccine, those who will probably get the vaccine and those who will definitely get the vaccine. The other [groups] can be regarded as hesitant,” she said.

“The challenge now is that if all those who say they will get the vaccine or probably will get the vaccine we will still be 8% short of the government target of 80%, so we need to convince the people who are currently hesitant to see the value of taking the vaccine.”

She said those aged 18-24 have decreased in vaccine acceptance since their third survey while acceptance in age groups above 55 is high.

“When we look at the youngest group, the rate of acceptance has actually declined from 63% to 55%...it is particularly among the youngest adults that there is a vaccine hesitancy,” said Alexander.

She said some people are facing an issue of access with some people only having access to vaccine sites that are far. “When we look at households that have a car, they are twice as likely to have been vaccinated as those without,” she said.

Although white people are more vaccine hesitant they have more access to resources such as transport and living in areas with sparse populations, which is why the group as a whole is doing better percentage-wise than black South Africans. Class differences also plays a part in access.

“If poorer people had the same kind of access to vaccines as those with cars, then far more would be vaccinated,” said Alexander.

People who support the ANC were found to be more likely to be vaccine accepting while those who support the EFF and DA were more likely to be vaccine hesitant. A mistrust in President Cyril Ramaphosa and his leadership also had an effect on vaccine hesitation. 

Some of the key reasons from those who are vaccine hesitant is: side effects from the vaccine, belief in their immune system and alternative and untested methods or medicines such as ivermectin and distrust of science and the government; while some young people believe they can afford to wait until next year to get vaccinated because their youth will protect them.

Though misinformation on vaccines is rife on social media, the two main forms of media consumption reported was television and radio across all age groups and races, meaning more vaccine positive messages should be shared on those platforms.

A large campaign to spread vaccine information ahead of the opening of the 18-34 age group in September was one of the key recommendations from the experts.