Why do parents willingness-to-pay to vaccinate their children against COVID-19? A real-world evidence in Taizhou, China

ABSTRACT

Purpose

This population-based cross-sectional study was conducted to explore whether parents are willing to pay to vaccinate their children against COVID-19 in China.

Methods

With a self-administered online questionnaire, we investigated parents’ willingness to pay for their children to be vaccinated against COVID-19 in Taizhou, China. Of the 1,845 parents who answered the structured questionnaire when they received an e-mail or e-poster invitation, 1788 samples with valid data underwent data analysis.

Results

A total of 66.1% of parents reported being willing to pay to inoculate their children with the COVID-19 vaccine. After adjustment for confounding factors, lower education level, one-child family (yes vs. no, OR = 1.35, 95%CI: 1.04–1.74), knowledge score of vaccination against COVID-19 (high vs. low, OR = 1.31, 95%CI: 1.01–1.69), awareness of the permitted use of the vaccine (yes vs. no, OR = 1.51, 95%CI: 1.16–1.97), and willingness to pay for a COVID-19 vaccine for themselves (yes vs. no, OR = 16.31, 95%CI: 12.59–21.14) were significantly associated with parents’ willingness to pay for their children.

Conclusion

We found that a moderate proportion of parents reported unwillingness to pay for their child to be vaccinated against COVID-19. The results indicate that further detailed assessment and more health education planning are required to increasing parents’ WTP for the vaccination of children in China.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• willingness-to-vaccine
• parents
• children
• China

Disclosure statement

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

Data sharing statement

All data underlying the findings are within the paper.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

A convenient sample was selected to receive the invitation for the survey. An anonymous self-administered questionnaire was voluntarily answered. We didn’t ask for a separate written informed consent because of anonymity. Parental participation in the survey was considered as informed consent. This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of Taizhou Hospital of Zhejiang Province (approval number: K20210520) in China.

Author contributions

J.S. Z. and T.H.T. conceived the study. M.X.Z., J.S. Z. and T.H.T. designed the questionnaire. J.S. Z. collected the data. M.X.Z. was responsible for the coding of the analyses. T.H.T. and M.X.Z. analyzed and interpreted the data, and wrote the first draft of the paper. X.Q.L and Y.C. searched, sorted and interpreted the relevant literature. All authors edited and approved the final manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

There were no sources of funding, along with any financial/other relationships for each author (such as consultancies, employment, expert testimony, honoraria, speakers bureaus, retainers, stock options or ownership).