Impact of covid-19 Sensitization and awareness programmes on the practice of vaccination by aged persons in Kogi State, Nigeria

Abstract

With an official position that denied the existence of COVID-19, oiled by low level of COVID-19 sensitisation and awareness programmes, Kogi State became a threat to be avoided by her other ten neighbouring federating States, in slowing down the transmissibility of the virus through vaccination. It was against this background that this study examined the impact of COVID-19 sensitization and awareness programmes on the practice of COVID-19 vaccination by aged persons in Kogi State Nigeria. This study, underpinned by psychological inoculation theory explained vaccine hesitancy as a reflection of COVID-19 awareness and sensitization programmes on aged persons. The study adopted triangulation research design with the aid of interview and questionnaire designed on a five Likert scale. Scientific sampling technique developed by Krejcie and Morgan (1970) which recommends a sample size of 384 for a population above seventy-five thousand (75,000) was used. The population of the aged persons in Kogi State is 146,143. Ordinary least squares regression and descriptive statistics was used to analyse data elicited. The study revealed that low COVID-19 sensitization and awareness programmes have negative effects on vaccine hesitancy of aged persons in Kogi State, Nigeria. Based on this finding, the study recommends that the Federal Government, Non Governmental and Faith based agencies should be actively in involved in pandemic-related sensitization, provision, warehousing and administration of vaccines in a bid to achieve community herd immunity so as to slow down transmissibility or outbreaks, and to void vaccine hesitancy which is mostly aggravated by misinformation and conspiracy theories.