More than half (51%) of US adults have not received a flu shot this season - and 32% don't intend to. Among other findings of a recent survey commissioned by the American Academy of Family Physicians, millennials, the nation's largest demographic group, are the least likely to get vaccinated, with 55% reporting they have not been inoculated this season.The survey explored the impact of misconceptions and misunderstandings about the flu and the vaccination among adults aged 25 to 73 years as well as how those perceptions might impact a decline in vaccination rates. Find out in the survey highlights below which groups are more influenced by antivaccination (anti-vaxx) rhetoric and who is more likely to forego a flu shot -- for themselves and for a child.
Flu Vaccination & US Adults: Knowledge, Attitudes, and Uptake
Methodology: The AAFP Flu Survey was conducted by Wakefield Researc among 1,000 Nationally Representative US Adults Ages 25-73, and an oversample to increase the sample size to 500 for the following audiences: Hispanic-Americans, African-Americans, and Asian-Americans, between November 27 and December 9, 2019, using an email invitation and an online survey. Quotas have been set to ensure reliable and accurate representation of US Adults Ages 25-73.
More than half of US adults have not received a flu shot this season and nearly one-third do not plan to get one.
More than half of millennials (b 1981-1996), a significant US demographic, have not received a flu shot this season and, reflecting the population at large, 33% are not planning to get one. It is proposed that antivaccination messages may be partly to blame.
Millennial explanations for not getting the flu shot include not having enough time and just plain forgetting. Their knowledge of the flu is just a bit lower than that of the general population, with 86% getting at least one fact wrong (vs 81% overall) and 31% getting them all wrong (vs 28% overall).
Antivaccination rhetoric may also affect black attitudes toward flu vaccination - 61% of those familiar with the messages self report that they agree with the rhetoric; however, black respondents are the group least familiar with the movement.
The flu vaccination rate among blacks is lower than among other ethnic groups -- more than half (55%) have not received a shot this year and 34% of those do not plan to get one.
Asian Americans are most informed about flu vaccination -- 88% agree that getting a flu shot protects others in the community vs 79% of adults surveyed overall who believe that. But those in the Asian American community who do not get a flu vaccination are more likely to believe they don't need it than those in other ethnic groups.
More than half (59%) of parents said a child had missed at least 1 flu shot and often agreed the reason was related to misinformation. One-in-five said they didn't want a child to get sick from a flu shot and 10% said they don't believe influenza is "that serious."
Men appear less aware of the dangers of influenza: nearly three-quarters (73%) significantly underestimated the number of deaths during the last flu season. Close to one-quarter of men (23%) vs only 5% of women would forgo a flu shot based on the belief that the flu isn't that serious.
