Ep 006: COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in Hong Kong, Contributing Factors and Next Steps

In this month’s episode, Dr David Owens and Professor Ben Cowling discuss the recent cases involving variants of concern, in Hong Kong. These cases have resulted in an increase in numbers of people being quarantined and subject to compulsory testing orders including those who have already completed vaccination.

The vaccination program in Hong Kong is efficient, free and vaccines are widely available, however the percentage of the overall population taking the vaccine continues to be low. In this podcast they discuss the factors which influence such a high level of vaccine hesitancy and contrast this with the high vaccine uptake in a recent survey of OT&P patients which showed 88.9% of patients to have had at least one vaccine in comparison to 13.4% in the population overall. They both make a case for relaxing quarantine restrictions for vaccinated individuals in order to create carrots and nudges for boosting vaccination rates.