Analysis of systemic and behavioral barriers to COVID-19 vaccination in rollout phase

ABSTRACT

Vaccines play a critical role in preventing deaths, and hospitalization caused by infectious diseases. This study utilized a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) to identify the systemic and behavioral barriers to vaccination for COVID-19. Then the study applied Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) Technique, Fuzzy-Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) to calculate the importance scores for these barriers. The study used a focus group of six experts working in healthcare for group decision-making. Three identified systemic barriers (importance score) were (1) Cost (0.048) (2) Convenience (0.043), and (3) Supply Chain Issue (0.037); while three behavioral barriers were (1) Complacency (0.128) (2) Lack of Trust (0.280), and (3) Lack of Awareness (0.488). The study concluded that the most important barrier to overcome was the Lack of Awareness followed by the Lack of Trust. The significant contribution of this study was that it established that the importance of behavioral barriers was significantly higher than the systemic barriers, which got more attention in planning. The result of the study concurred with the findings of the SLR. Thus, this study provided a descriptive and prescriptive framework for overcoming barriers to vaccination in resource-constrained countries. The findings of the study are useful for policymakers and healthcare administrators.

KEYWORDS:

• Vaccination
• COVID-19
• systemic barriers
• behavioral barriers
• vaccine hesitancy
• fuzzy-AHP

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.

Notes on contributors

Vinaytosh Mishra

Vinaytosh Mishra is working as an Associate Professor at the College of Healthcare Management and Economics, Gulf Medical University, Ajman, UAE. He has done his Bachelor of Technology (Electronics) and Ph.D. (Healthcare Management) from the Indian Institute of Technology (BHU), Varanasi. He also holds an MBA (Marketing and Operations) from Nirma University, Ahmedabad. His research interests include Health System Design, Health Policy, Healthcare Operations, Healthcare Supply Chain Management, Health Economics, and Digital Health.