Small donations making a huge difference: Individual contributions can facilitate worldwide vaccination against COVID-19

Abstract

The COVAX initiative provides low- and middle-income countries with equitable access and financial support to source vaccines against COVID-19. The initiative is primarily funded by wealthy governments but should also consider promoting individual donations. We conducted a quota-representative study with 994 German participants to investigate individuals’ donation intentions. About one-third of participants expressed willingness to contribute to the initiative. When projecting these donations to the whole population, the initiative could raise hundreds of millions of euros in Germany alone. As people with stronger vaccination intentions are more willing to donate, vaccination centres could be an ideal setting for collecting donations.