Vaccine hesitancy among U.S. adults at record low: Poll

The percentage of Americans reluctant to receive a COVID-19 vaccination has reached its lowest point since the preventive shots became widely available, new polling showed Tuesday.

Conducted by Ipsos for Axios, the poll found that one in five adults in the U.S. remains opposed to getting vaccinated against COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.

Twenty percent of 1,071 adults said they are unlikely to get vaccinated against COVID-19, including 6% who said they are “not very likely” to receive a shot and 14% who said it was “not at all likely.”

Ipsos and Axios noted that the opposition among respondents surveyed as part of their latest poll, conducted Aug. 27-30, is the lowest they have recorded since they started asking about vaccine hesitancy.

In early April, for example, when Ipsos first began asking people, 29% said they were not very likely (10%) or not at all likely (19%) to get vaccinated against COVID-19.

At least a couple of factors are likely to be responsible for that reluctance seeming to wane.

The U.S. has recently experienced a surge in cases of COVID-19, related hospitalizations and deaths fueled by infections caused by the more contagious delta variant.

Regulators with the Food and Drug Administration last week gave their full approval to a two-shot COVID-19 vaccine made by Pfizer and BioNTech, one of three administered in the U.S.

Public health officials have predicted full FDA approval will prompt more Americans to get vaccinated. Some may seem less skeptical, while others might be obligated by their employer or school through vaccine mandates.

“Schools, organizations, companies, governments implementing mandates are forcing people to deal with them,” said Cliff Young, president of U.S. public affairs for Ipsos. “That’s what going on.”

More than 173 million people in the U.S, including 63.4% of those 18 and older, are considered fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The results of the poll have a margin of error of plus or minus 3.2 percentage points.