Psychosocial analysis of vaccine reluctance factors against COVID-19 among health workers in Ngaoundere Urbain health district

The aim of this research is to study the determinants of reluctance to vaccinate against COVID-19 among staff in the Ngaoundere Urbain health district. The COVID-19 disease emerged in China since December 2019 and rapidly spread around the world, taking on a pandemic status. Cameroon has been facing this pandemic since March 2020. In December 2020, the WHO adopted vaccination as a priority strategy to limit mortality due to this disease. Cameroon has been implementing this strategy since April 2021, but vaccination coverage remains low. Taking into account the level of knowledge of healthcare staff on the importance of vaccination and being direct actors in this policy, these staff do
not systematically adhere to vaccination against COVID-19. Vaccination data for staff in the Ngaoundere Urbain health district as at June 01, 2022, show 476 staff vaccinated, for a target of 1029, i.e. 46.3% vaccination coverage. Correlational analysis showed a strong link between reluctance to vaccinate and contextual factors (r = .8008; p < 0.01), lifestyle (r = .4211; p < 0.05), psychosocial factors (r = .6993; p < 0.01) and peer influence (r = .4665; p < 0.05). The results of this research will provide some answers to the observed paradox of low adherence to COVID-19 vaccination among healthcare workers, with the aim of strengthening communication strategies to improve vaccination coverage.

Keywords: psychosocial analysis, reluctance, vaccine, COVID-19, healthcare workers