PM2070: A Novel Approach to Address Concerns from an Underserved Community About the COVID-19 Vaccine: A Partnership Between Schools and Academia

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected racial and ethnic minority children in terms of morbidity and mortality. Despite the approval of the COVID-19 vaccine for children 5 years of age and older, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports approximately half of parents are still unsure or will not vaccinate their children. We sought to identify the factors and sources of information that lead to confidence in the COVID-19 vaccine along with the barriers that prevent parents from vaccinating their child.

Methods: As part of an academic institution, we partnered with local schools and expert physicians to host a series of virtual town halls that were conducted in both English and Spanish. A physician would provide information on the current COVID-19 disease burden and vaccination data followed by a Q&A portion. At the conclusion of each town hall, a bilingual parent survey was distributed through REDCap. Descriptive and inferential statistics were computed on the survey data.

Results: Over four town hall meetings from December 2021 to April 2022, we had 107 parent respondents (91.6% identified as Hispanic, 68.3% high school diploma or below, 194 children with a mean age of 10 years). Among the parents, 95.3% had received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. However, only 79.4% of eligible children had received at least one dose. The top three reasons for vaccinating were their physician’s recommendations, to protect others with a weaker immune system and because they recognized that COVID-19 is a serious problem in their community. There was no correlation between the parent’s level of education and the factors leading to vaccination (Figure 1). Among parents that have not vaccinated their child(ren), the most common reasons given included low confidence in vaccine safety, personal choice, and that family or friends would not support vaccinating (Figure 2). 71.8% of the families strongly agreed or agreed that the session was educational. Of those children who were not vaccinated, 59.1% of parents strongly agreed or agreed that they were more likely to vaccinate their child after attending the town hall.

Conclusion: This study highlights the importance of partnership between academia and the community to deliver COVID-19 vaccine information through virtual bilingual town halls. Not only did the majority of participants find the information provided helpful, but by addressing the barriers and fears surrounding the vaccine, there was a positive influence on their decision to vaccinate their child(ren). A minority of parents remained hesitant about the vaccine even after the workshop. To increase vaccination rates, larger studies among different racial and ethnic groups are needed to capture the reasons for vaccine hesitancy and address those concerns through community and academia partnerships.