Open AccessReady, Set, Vaccine: The Path to COVID-19 Recovery in Latin America
Author(s) -
Kelly Senters Piazza,
Alexandria Schwier
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
revista latinoamericana de opinión pública
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2660-700X
pISSN - 1852-9003
DOI - 10.14201/rlop.26940
Subject(s) - latin americans , vaccination , plea , pandemic , political science , politics , public opinion , covid-19 , development economics , medicine , virology , economics , law , disease , pathology , infectious disease (medical specialty)
The coronavirus pandemic has ravaged countries across Latin America. Although the region continues to suffer, the promise of vaccinations provides reason for hope. As vaccines become more widely accessible in Latin America, public support for and willingness to receive the vaccine will be essential to pandemic recovery. Recognizing this, politicians in the region are already actively publicly promoting vaccination. In this research note, we explore Latin Americans’ attitudes on vaccine acceptance as well as the influence of political recruitment for vaccination and both consumption of and trust in news from politicians on self-reported attitudes of vaccine acceptance. We learn that, in general, Latin Americans are receptive to vaccination but that acceptance varies as a function of country, time, and recruitment and, interestingly, that Latin Americans are actually dissuaded from vaccination if encouraged by politicians. We conclude with a discussion and a plea that vaccination campaigns remain separate from political ones.