NEW YORK (Reuters) – A growing number of Americans want to get the coronavirus vaccine, and a majority also support workplace, lifestyle and travel restrictions for those not vaccinated against COVID-19, according to a Reuters / Ipsos poll released Friday.
The national poll of 1,005 people, conducted on Monday and Tuesday, suggested that the rate of vaccinations could increase as more vaccines become available and more people want them.
In total, 54% of the respondents said they were “very interested” in vaccination. That was up from a survey in January, when 41% showed the same interest, and 38% in a May 2020 survey before developing a coronavirus vaccine.
Interest in the vaccine has increased among whites and racial minorities over the past year, with about six in ten whites and five in ten members of minority groups now showing great interest.
Twenty-seven percent of Americans said they were not interested in vaccination, which was relatively unchanged from a similar survey that took place in May.
But in anticipation of the social challenges that could arise as the United States begins to withdraw from the years-long pandemic, the latest poll showed that a majority of Americans want to limit the ways unvaccinated people can go public. to blend.
According to the poll, 72 percent of Americans said it was important to know “if the people around me have been vaccinated.”
A majority – 62% – said unvaccinated people should not be allowed to travel on airplanes. Fifty-five percent agreed that unvaccinated people shouldn’t exercise in public gyms, go to movie theaters, or attend public concerts.
When asked about the workplace, 60% of Americans said they wanted to work for an employer “that requires everyone to get a coronavirus vaccine before returning to the office,” and 56% said that unvaccinated workers should stay at home.
‘DIFFERENT STATUS’
Businesses could soon feel increasing pressure to address those concerns. About 18% of the U.S. population has already received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine, and President Joe Biden said in a televised address Thursday evening that he would order states to make all adults eligible for the vaccine by May 1.
Dr. Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, said the poll responses made sense given the social constraints placed on everyone over the past year.
“People say, ‘If I’m vaccinated, it will change my life,'” said Adalja. “And if you haven’t been vaccinated, that’s your choice. But you get a different status because you might be a carrier of this virus, so you could be spreading it to another unvaccinated person. ”
The poll results were somewhat divided along party lines. Republicans, who were generally less concerned than others about the coronavirus over the past year, were also less supportive than Democrats of work and lifestyle restrictions for unvaccinated, according to the poll.
But even among Republicans, four in ten said they wanted to make sure people without vaccinations didn’t go to gyms or movie theaters. Five in ten Republicans think vaccines should be needed for air travel.
The Reuters / Ipsos survey was conducted online in English across the United States. It had a credibility interval, a measure of precision, of 4 percentage points.
Reporting by Chris Kahn; Editing by Peter Cooney