Vaccination is a key tool to mitigate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. In Israel, COVID-19 vaccines became available to adults in December 2020 and to 5–11-year-old children in November 2021. Ahead of the vaccine roll-out in children, we aimed to determine whether surveyed parents intended to vaccinate their children and describe reasons for their intentions. We collected information on parental socio-demographic characteristics, COVID-19 vaccine history, intention to vaccinate their children against COVID-19, and reasons for parental decisions using an anonymous online survey. We identified associations between parental characteristics and plans to vaccinate children using a logistic regression model and described reasons for intentions to vaccinate or not. Parental non-vaccination and having experienced major vaccination side effects were strongly associated with non-intention to vaccinate their children (OR 0.09 and 0.18 respectively, p < .001). Parents who were younger, lived in the socio-economically deprived periphery, and belonged to the Arab population had lower intentions to vaccinate their children. Reasons for non-intention to vaccinate included concerns about vaccine safety and efficacy (53%, 95%CI 50–56) and the belief that COVID-19 is a mild disease (73%, 95%CI 73–79), while a frequent motive for vaccination was the return to normal social and educational life (89%, 95%CI 87–91). Understanding rationales for COVID-19 vaccine rejection or acceptance, as well as parental demographic data, can pave the way for intentional educational campaigns to encourage not only vaccination against COVID-19, but also regular childhood vaccine programming.

Deployment of a field hospital to a natural disaster area should take into account the type and geographic location of the disaster as well as the high number of nontraumatic ocular conditions.

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BackgroundVaccination is a key tool to mitigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. In Israel, COVID-19 vaccines became available to adults in December 2020 and to 5–11-year-old children in November 2021. Ahead of the vaccine roll-out in children, we aimed to determine whether parents intended to vaccinate their children and describe reasons for their intentions.MethodsWe recruited parents on social media and collected information on parental socio-demographic characteristics, COVID-19 vaccine history, intention to vaccinate their children against COVID-19, and reasons for parental decisions, using an anonymous online survey. We identified associations between parental characteristics and intention to vaccinate children using a logistic regression model and described reasons for intentions to vaccinate or not using proportions together with 95% confidence intervals (CI).Results1837 parents participated. Parental non-vaccination and having experienced major vaccination side effects were strongly associated with non-intention to vaccinate their children (OR 0.09 and 0.18 respectively, p<0.001). Compared with others, parents who were younger, lived in the socio-economically deprived periphery, and belonged to the Arab population had lower intentions to vaccinate their children. Commonly stated reasons for non-intention to vaccinate included vaccine safety and efficacy (53%, 95%CI 50-56) and the belief that COVID-19 was a mild disease (73%, 95%CI 73-79). The most frequently mentioned motives for intending to vaccine children was returning to normal social and educational life (89%, 95%CI 87-91).ConclusionParental socio-demographic background and their own vaccination experience was associated with intention to vaccinate their children aged 5-11. Intention to vaccinate was mainly for social and economic reasons rather than health, whereas non-intention to vaccinate mainly stemmed from health concerns. Understanding rationales for COVID-19 vaccine rejection or acceptance, as well as parental demographic data, can pave the way for intentional educational campaigns to encourage not only vaccination against COVID-19, but also regular childhood vaccine programming.HighlightsParental intention to vaccinate 5-11 children is much lower than vaccine coverage in parental age groupsBeing unvaccinated and having experienced side effects following vaccination were the greatest negative predictors in parents of intention to vaccinate their childrenParents were more likely to accept a COVID-19 vaccine for their children to allow them to return to daily social life and to ensure economic security in the familyParents were more likely to reject a COVID-19 vaccination for health reasons such as safety concerns or due the belief that COVID-19 was a mild disease in children