Awareness and Knowledge Towards Pediatric and Adult COVID-19 Vaccination: A Cross Sectional Community-based Study in Saudi Arabia

BACKGROUND: As the covid-19 vaccination programs scaling up globally, there remains a growing concern about the community level awareness towards it. We aimed to assess the knowledge and awareness among general population towards covid-19 in adult and pediatric population. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study was to assess the knowledge and awareness among adult Saudi people toward covid-19 vaccine for adults and children. METHODS: We conducted a cross sectional, community-based study among a representative sample (N=1373) of adult population in Saudi Arabia during October 2021. A structured, closed ended and pre-tested questionnaire was used online to collect the quantitative data through non-random sampling. RESULTS: A great majority (91%) considered the seriousness of covid-19. About 80% perceived the available vaccines to be highly protective against the COVID-19 infection and complications. While about 69.7% agreed that pediatric vaccination will reduce the spread of covid-19, about 77.3% agreed on encouraging the parents to vaccinate their children. Only 43% were aware that vaccination is safe for breast feeding women and about 50.6% considered the vaccination to be safe in pregnant females. About 52.8% responded that the pediatric vaccine has same safety as efficacy as that in adults. The association with knowledge items was observed to be significant (p<0.05) with occupation, education, income and being previously affected with covid-19. CONCLUSION: Overall, a high level of awareness was observed in our study, however, there were factors observed to be taken care such as vaccination in breast feeding and pregnant females as well as concerns related to safety and efficacy for pediatric vaccination.