I have a few thoughts on this and similar polls that ask people if they'll get vaccinated.
1. In the medium run, the limiting factor is likely to be access and availability to the vaccine.
1. In the medium run, the limiting factor is likely to be access and availability to the vaccine.
That is to say, if we get to the point where **everyone who wants a vaccine can get one in reasonably short order**, then we can start thinking about how to persuade more people to be vaccinated. But getting to that first point may not be easy.
2. Headlines on polls like these can sometimes be misleading by treating "not sure" responses as "no". You'll have a poll result like e.g. 40% yes, 20% no, 40% "need to learn more", and the headline will frame it as "only 40% will get vaccinated!" when really it's 40-80%.
3. In polls like these, people sometimes aren't very good at predicting their own future behavior under what for now is a hypothetical scenario. So it might be good look at empirical rates of vaccination instead to predict what % will ultimately be vaccinated.
4. It seems likely to me that many activities will *require* a vaccine, including many schools and some employers. Also many leisure activities: Want to attend a Knicks game? Fly to Cancun? Enter a nursing home? Show proof of a vaccine or a recent negative test.
I'm not sure about all of the political and legal implications here. But if people see a vaccine as a ticket back to normal life, not just for society but also in a more literal way for themselves personally, that could encourage more vaccination.
5. I think it's best to see a vaccine in combination with other interventions rather than a magic bullet. And I'd also keep in mind that the math on when we hit herd immunity is a bit complicated. quantamagazine.org/the-tricky-mat…
Among other things, the combination of some people being vaccinated, some people having had COVID previously (depending on how long immunity lasts) and perhaps some people having a degree of preexisting immunity because of other coronavirus would all count toward that threshold.
