Gender and Age as Predictors of COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy among Secondary School Teachers in North-East Senatorial District of Benue State A Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

This study investigated gender and age as predictors of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among secondary school teachers in North-East Senatorial District of Benue State. A descriptive cross-sectional design was used. A sample size of 674 was selected from a population of 6,962 secondary school teachers in the North-East Senatorial District using proportionate stratified and simple random sampling techniques. A face-validated 28-item researcher-developed instrument titled “COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy Questionnaire (COV-19VHQ) was used for data collection. Frequencies and percentages were used to describe the sociodemographic characteristics of the respondents and to answer the research questions, while binary logistic regression was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 alpha level. The results showed that most of the teachers (89.5%) were not vaccinated against COVID-19, and majority (70.5%) were COVID-19 vaccine hesitant. The results of binary logistic regression analysis showed that gender did not significantly predict COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy (OR = 1.034, p = .885, 95% CI = 0.660 - 1.618). The results, however, showed that age significantly predicted COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy (OR = 0.009, p < .001, 95% CI = 0.003 - 0.025) as the participants of younger age were more likely to be hesitant than participants aged 50 years or above. The authors therefore, recommended that the Government of Benue State should make COVID-19 vaccination a condition for teaching in all schools in the state, and the intervention efforts in curbing COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy should specifically target teachers of younger age.