Coronavirus and vaccine attitudes and behaviours in England: over 80s population, 15 February to 20 February 2021

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office for national statistics

Statistical bulletin

4 March 2021

Coronavirus and vaccine attitudes and behaviours in England: over 80s population, 15 February to 20 February 2021

Experimental statistics from the Over 80s Vaccines Insights Study. This release contains analysis of people aged over 80 in England during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, including attitudes, behaviours and wellbeing in relation to the COVID-19 vaccination.

Main points:

  • Vaccine behaviours: An estimated two out of five (41%) over 80s who had received the first dose of a vaccine less than three weeks ago reported they had met someone other than a household member, care worker or member of their support bubble, indoors; this appears to contradict lockdown regulations.

  • Attitude to the vaccine: A quarter (25%) of over 80s who had only received one dose of a COVID-19 vaccination reported that they would be much or somewhat more likely to attend a hospital for medical reasons since being vaccinated; this increased to one-third (33%) for those who had received both doses.

  • Almost half (49%) of over 80s perceived the coronavirus to be a major or significant risk to them personally without vaccination; this decreased to 5% if they were to receive both doses of the vaccine.

  • Side effects: Of over 80s who had received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, 41% had experienced side effects.

  • Of those who had experienced side effects and were still awaiting their second dose of a vaccine, 63% said the side effects would not affect their decision to get the second dose, and 35% were more likely to get the second dose.

  • Support for the vaccine: Around 19 out of 20 over 80s (96%) would be very or somewhat likely to encourage others to get a COVID-19 vaccination.

Tim Gibbs, Public Service Analysis Team, said:

“The rollout of the COVID-19 vaccination is, no doubt, a huge relief to many people aged over 80, as we can see that almost half of all them, when asked, considered COVID-19 to be a major or significant personal risk before receiving the vaccination – this decreases to just 5% having the same concern after hypothetically receiving both doses of the vaccine.

“It will hopefully also improve a wider quality of life for this group. We can see that one third of over 80s who had received two or more doses of the vaccine reported they would be more likely to attend a hospital for a medical reason since being vaccinated.

“We hope to start to see these wider positive effects of the vaccine rollout as it continues across more age groups in the coming weeks.”

Notes to editors:

Please note that due to the limited period in which fieldwork took place, it is difficult to reach a large number of people and therefore the overall sample size for the survey is limited.

This data was collected between 15 February and 20 February 2021. The sample size was 2,070, out of an estimated population of 2,837,000 over 80s in England (based on Mid-2019 population estimates) and survey weighting was used to weight the sample estimates to provide estimates for the population of over 80s. The estimates were weighted, adjusting for:

  • sex
  • age
  • region

All answers are self-reported. Approximately 1% of respondents to the survey were residing in a care or nursing home.

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