Implications of attitudes and beliefs about COVID-19 vaccines for vaccination campaigns in the United States: A latent class analysis

Unprecedented global efforts in vaccine development have resulted in effective vaccines for COVID-19. The pandemic response in the US has been highly politicized, resulting in significant opposition to public health efforts, including vaccines. We aimed to understand patterns of attitudes and beliefs about the COVID-19 vaccine to inform vaccination campaigns. 583 English speaking United States adults were surveyed November 18–29, 2020. Participants answered 11 questions about their attitudes and beliefs about a COVID-19 vaccine, including perceived vaccine effectiveness, likelihood of getting vaccinated, and concerns that vaccine development was rushed/influenced by politics. We conducted a latent class analysis to identify profiles of attitudes/beliefs about a COVID-19 vaccine. We identified four classes of COVID-19 vaccine beliefs. The pro-vaccine class (28.8%) was willing to get vaccinated and had broadly positive beliefs about the vaccine. The development concerns class (27.8%) was willing to get vaccinated but was concerned about the development process. The third class (22.6%) was largely unsure if they would get vaccinated and if their peer groups would be vaccinated. The forth class (anti-vaccine, 20.8%) was dominated by an unwillingness to get vaccinated, vaccine distrust, vaccine development concerns, and peers groups with negative vaccine intentions. Given the large proportion of individuals who were concerned about the COVID-19 vaccine development process, messaging about rigor and approval processes may be critical to securing this group’s commitment to vaccination. Having scientific and cultural leaders endorse vaccination may also be influential.