Eric Crampton • Mar 13, 2021 •
Thomas Lumley runs the numbers on herd immunity and vaccination: Cutting transmission by 90% would need nearly everyone to be vaccinated. What if only 50% were vaccinated? Well, suppose someone with the virus would have passed it on to two people, but one of them is vaccinated. Instead of two new cases, we get one new case. Or, in … Read More
Guest Author • Mar 09, 2021 •
Jagadish Thaker, Massey University As Aotearoa New Zealand begins the third week of COVID-19 vaccinations, the focus turns from the 12,000-strong border workforce to their families and household contacts. Frontline health and emergency staff will be next in line, followed by the general population. While we can expect border, health and emergency workers to be largely supportive of vaccination, … Read More
Guest Author • Dec 11, 2020 •
Claire Breen, University of Waikato The emergency approval of the Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in the UK and the imminent roll-out of several other vaccines in 2021 raises serious questions about New Zealand’s likely uptake of this vital public health response. Recent research into New Zealanders’ attitudes to vaccination suggest positions have become more polarised over the last decade, … Read More
Alison Campbell • Jan 17, 2019 •
You read that right. Vaccine hesitancy – “the reluctance or refusal to vaccinate despite the availability of vaccines” – is viewed by the World Health Organisation as one of the top 10 health threats we face in 2019. And worse, that hesitancy will have an effect on other threats in that top 10 list. Ebola and the potential … Read More