The Role of Television Media on Disseminating Covid-19 Vaccination Information in Nigeria
CHAPTER ONE
Objectives of the study
Generally, the study is focused on evaluating the role of television media in disseminating COVID-19 vaccination information in Nigeria. To achieve this, the study will specifically:
- determine the rate of awareness of youth to covid vaccine.
- determine the extent of knowledge of the youth on covid 19 vaccination.
- determine the attitude of youth to covid 19 vaccination messages.
- determine whether television media encourage more vaccination intent.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
Conceptual Framework
Overview of Coronavirus
Coronavirus disease 2019 (abbreviated “COVID-19”) is an emerging respiratory disease that is caused by a novel coronavirus and was first detected in December 2019 in Wuhan, China 2021 (Abdallah and Lee, 2021). The disease is highly infectious, and its main clinical symptoms include fever, dry cough, fatigue, myalgia, and dyspnea. In China, 18.5% of the patients with COVID-19 develop to the severe stage, which is characterized by acute respiratory distress syndrome, septic shock, difficult-to-tackle metabolic acidosis, and bleeding and coagulation dysfunction (Utibe, 2019).
The first infected patient who had clinical manifestations such as fever, cough, and dyspnea was reported on 12 December 2019 in Wuhan, China. Since then, 2019-nCoV has spread rapidly to other countries via different ways such as airline traveling and now, COVID-19 is the world’s pandemic problem (Felix, 2020).
Coronaviruses (CoV) infections are emerging respiratory viruses and known to cause illness ranging from the common cold to severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) (Yin et al., 2019). CoV is zoonotic pathogens that can be transmitted via animal-to-human and human-to-human. Multiple epidemic outbreaks occurred during 2002 (SARS) with ~800 deaths and 2012 (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome: MERS-CoV) with 860 deaths (Lee, 2020). Approximately eight years after the MERS-CoV epidemic, the current outbreak of novel coronavirus (COVID-19) in Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China, has emerged as a global outbreak and significant public health issue. On 30 January 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 as a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC). Astonishingly, in the first week of March, a devastating number of new cases have been reported globally, emerging as a pandemic. As of 9 March 2020, more than 110,000 confirmed cases across 105 countries and more than 3800 deaths have been reported (Philemon et al., 2020).
The COVID-19 is spread by human-to-human through droplets, feco-oral, and direct contact, with an incubation period of 2-14 days. So far, no antiviral treatment or vaccine has been recommended explicitly for COVID-19. Therefore, applying the preventive measure to control COVID-19 infection is the utmost critical intervention. Healthcare workers (HCWs) are the primary section in contact with patients and are an important source of exposure to the infected cases in the healthcare settings, thus, expected to be at a high risk of infections. By the end of January, the WHO and CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) have published recommendations for the prevention and control of COVID-19 for HCWs. Indeed, the WHO also initiated several online training sessions and materials on COVID-19 in various languages to strengthen the preventive strategies, including raising awareness, and training HCWs preparedness activities (Malik, 2020). In several instances, misunderstandings of HCWs delayed controlling efforts to provide necessary treatment, implicate rapid spread of infection in hospitals, and also may put the patients’ lives at risk. In this regard, the COVID-19 epidemic offers a unique opportunity to investigate the level of knowledge, and perceptions of HCWs during this global health crisis. Besides, we also explored the role of different information sources in shaping HCWs knowledge and perceptions on COVID-19 during this peak period.
It seems that the current widespread outbreak has been partly associated with a delay in diagnosis and poor infection control procedures. As transmission within hospitals and protection of healthcare workers are important steps in the epidemic, the understanding or having enough information regarding sources, clinical manifestations, transmission routes, and prevention ways among healthcare workers can play roles for this gal assessment (Malik, 2020). Since nurses are in close contact with infected people, they are the main part of the infection transmission chain and their knowledge of 2019-nCoV prevention and protection procedures can help prevent the transmission chain. Iran is one of the most epidemic countries for COVID-19 and there is no information regarding the awareness and attitude of Iranian nurses about this infectious disease 2021 (Abdallah and Lee, 2021).
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Introduction
This chapter documents the methods employed by the researcher in assessing the impact of online covid 19 vaccine educational messages on youth behavior in University of Ilorin. This chapter presents the research design, population of the study, sampling technique, instrumentation, reliability and validation of the study, method of data collection and method of data analysis.
Research design
Research design is the strategy employed by a researcher for conducting academic research by addressing research objectives, research questions and hypotheses by collecting, interpreting and analyzing data. This study used a survey design method. The survey research design was used because the study relied on primary data collected from sampled respondents.
Population of the study
The population of a study is the represents the total number of individuals from whom the study data was gathered in the study area. The population of this study consisted of students at University of Ilorin. The total population of the study was 133 students, collected from the different departments in the school.
CHAPTER FOUR
DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS
Results
Sociodemographic representation of respondents
Table 4.1 presented the sociodemographic representation of respondents in the University of Ilorin. The result showed that majority of the respondents were female with a total of 84, while only 16 of them were male. Also, majority of the respondents fell within the age range of 18 – 25 with a total of 61 while 39 of the respondents fell within the age range of 25 – 35. Additionally, 20 respondents each reported from 100 level, 200 level, and 300 level respectively while 40 respondents reported from 400 level. Finally, 82 of the respondents belong to the Christianity religion, 13 belong to the Islam religion while only 5 had other religions not listed.
CHAPTER FIVE
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Conclusion
This study was carried out on the role of television media on disseminating Covid-19 vaccination information in Nigeria in University of Ilorin. With the advent of mass vaccination to quell the COVID-19 pandemic, the distribution of strategically placed public health information regarding COVID-19 vaccination, delivered in locally customized and culturally appropriate language, may be instrumental in increasing the general public’s willingness to accept the COVID-19 vaccine. Our study findings raise major concerns about equitable vaccination, with poorer and less educated individuals having lower acceptance. Particularly concerning is also the lower acceptance among individuals with chronic disease who most require the vaccinations. There is an urgent need to further explore and address the fears and concerns of these groups to ensure equitable access to and utilization of COVID-19 vaccines.
The study showed that messages emphasizing the personal risks of failing to vaccinate against COVID, as well as the potential collective public health consequences of low vaccine uptake, are effective at convincing Americans to plan to get a COVID vaccine, once one becomes available. These effects are similar for Democrats, Republicans, and Independents alike. Consequently, we recommend that health communicators aiming to boost COVID vaccine uptake consider employing one or both of these frames as part of their strategic communication efforts.
Given the importance of widespread vaccination against COVID-19, several additional directions for future research are particularly important to pursue. First, while our analysis suggests that messages from ordinary Americans and experts can both be effective (with slightly better outcomes for ordinary individuals), more work is needed to determine if certain types of communicators within each category are better at conveying messages that others. On the non-expert side, understanding the value of contextual cues of the messenger (e.g., gender, partisanship, and race) will be critical to identifying the best communicators for the importance of vaccination.
Beyond message sources, additional research is also needed to determine how repeated message exposure and exposure to countervailing messages influence vaccination intention. While our experimental design is useful for isolating the effectiveness of specific pro-vaccine messages, we cannot capture the complexities of an information environment in which people will be presented with competing pro and anti-vaccination messages. Future research would benefit from exploring how COVID-19 vaccination messages interact and influence behavior.
Finally, it is critical to acknowledge that our experimental design did little to alter the planned behavior of individuals who were skeptical of the vaccine’s safety and efficacy. Improving vaccination among those most hesitant could prove vital to reaching the immunization rates needed to achieve herd immunity. Future research should explore additional messaging strategies to improve vaccination intention in this group.
Recommendations
The health authorities via health care providers, who were identified by the people as the most trust source of information regarding information about COVID-19 vaccines, should design interventions in terms of awareness campaigns via all types of multimedia to spread more transparent information about the safety and efficacy of the vaccines. The awareness campaigns should also shed the light over the new technology that was utilized in the production of few of them in order to boost COVID-19 vac- cines acceptance. Making the vaccine available for free or at subsidized prices by the government could as well enhance vaccines acceptance among the population.
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