Assessment of Knowledge, Attitude, and Perception towards COVID-19 Vaccine among the General Population in the Hail Province, KSA
Azharuddin Sajid Syed Khaja *
Deptartment of Pathology, College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Mubashir Zafar
Deptartment of Family and Community Medicine, College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Meshari Al-Shammari
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Khaled Al-Shammary
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Abdulaziz Al-Rabie
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Abdulaziz Al-Tamimi
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Abdullah Al-Juhani
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Abdulrahman Al-Harbi
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Akram Al-Nabri
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Lafi Al-Sulami
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Sami Al-Enazi
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Yasser Al-Rashidi
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Ziyad Al-Shammari
College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Syed Abrar Ali
Deptartment of Ophthalmology, College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
Mohd. Saleem
Deptartment of Pathology, College of Medicine, University of Hail, Hail, Saudi Arabia.
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
Aim: Coronavirus infection has caused disease at the pandemic level with several deaths worldwide and affected all aspects of human life. One way to minimize virus transmission and its effects is to perform mass vaccination within the general population so that herd immunity is developed against the SARS-CoV-2 virus. However, low health literacy and vaccine hesitancy are potential threats in achieving this. The present study is designed to measure the Knowledge, Attitude, and Perception levels towards COVID-19 and assess public perception and acceptance levels of the vaccine among the general population in the Hail province of Saudi Arabia.
Methods: A bilingual, community-based questionnaire, consisting of the respondents’ socio-demographic profile, COVID-19 knowledge, and attitude & perception towards COVID-19 vaccination, was circulated using different social media platforms. The collected data was analyzed using SPSS software.
Results: Appropriate knowledge level was found in 74.8% of the respondents, whereas inappropriate knowledge levels were observed in females and participants with non-health-related occupations and were inversely related to willingness to the vaccine. More than 60% of the respondents had a negative attitude towards the COVID-19 vaccine, as only 51% were willing to get vaccinated. A negative attitude was significantly associated with female respondents.
Conclusion: Our study reports a high knowledge level among the respondents in the Hail province. However, there is also a decreased willingness to be vaccinated, suggesting that more vaccine and health literacy seminars should be conducted to generate awareness among the general population in the Hail province, KSA.
Keywords: Knowledge, attitude, perception, Coronavirus, COVID-19 vaccine, vaccine hesitancy, health literacy