Predictors of self and parental vaccination decisions in England during the 2009 H1N1 pandemic: Analysis of the Flu Watch pandemic cohort data

During the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, UK uptake of the pandemic influenza vaccine was very low. Furthermore, attitudes governing UK vaccination uptake during a pandemic are poorly characterised. To the best of our knowledge, there is no published research explicitly considering predictors of both adult self-vaccination and decisions regarding whether or not to vaccinate one’s children among the UK population during the H1N1 pandemic. We therefore aimed to identify predictors of both self-vaccination decisions and parental vaccination decisions using data collected during the H1N1 pandemic as part of the Flu Watch cohort study. Data were analysed separately for 798 adults and 85 children: exploratory factor analysis facilitated reduction of 16 items on attitudes to pandemic vaccine into a smaller number of factors. Single variable analyses with vaccine uptake as the outcome were used to identify variables that were predictive of vaccination in children and adults. Potential predictors were: attitudinal factors created by data reduction, age group, sex, region, deprivation, ethnicity, chronic condition, vocation, healthcare-related occupation and previous influenza vaccination. Consistent with previous literature concerning adult self-vaccination decisions, we found that vaccine efficacy/safety and perceived risk of pandemic influenza were significant predictors of both self-vaccination decisions and parental vaccination decisions. This study provides the first systematic attempt to understand both the predictors of self and parental vaccination uptake among the UK general population during the H1N1 pandemic. Our findings indicate that concerns about vaccine safety, and vaccine effectiveness may be a barrier to increased uptake for both self and parental vaccination.