Background:

The Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) started in Wuhan city of China and has wrecked so much havoc on the lives of millions around the world. COVID-19 is a global public health threat facing mankind. Because of this, the WHO has approved the use of some vaccines to stop the spread of the virus. The COVID-19 Vaccines were rolled out as an exit strategy from the pandemic but have been met by a strong hesitancy to its uptake and hence a delay in achieving a successful fight against COVID-19. This paper evaluates the factors that might affect the perception of pharmacy students of the University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN) towards COVID-19 Vaccines uptake.

Method:

A cross-sectional study among 132 Pharmacy undergraduate students was carried out at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) with a structured, validated online questionnaire. The questionnaire consisted of 3 sections: socio-demographic details of respondents, students’ knowledge of COVID-19 vaccines and students’ perception towards COVID-19 vaccines. The data analysis was entered into SPSS version 22 for appropriate descriptive and inferential statistical analysis with the level of significance predetermined at a p-value <0.05.

Results:

32.6% of the students agreed that the COVID-19 vaccines are safe and efficacious. While 18.9% were willing to take the vaccines, 72.7% are hesitant because of the potential side effects associated with the vaccines. Additionally, 31.1% are hesitant due to the rigorous process involved in vaccination. Furthermore, 40.9% agreed to the fact that the approval and rolling out of the vaccines were quick thus, doubting the efficaciousness of the vaccines.

Conclusion:

The potential side effects of the COVID-19 vaccines and the perception that “the vaccines are not efficacious” were the two most important factors that highlighted the hesitancy of COVID-19 vaccines uptake among UNN pharmacy students.

Keywords: COVID-19 Vaccine, Vaccine Uptake, Perception, Pharmacy Students.