Why are parents hesitant to have their teens vaccinated against HPV?

Parental hesitancy against the HPV shot remains very common in the US, a recent study has found. Concerns about safety and side effects are the most common reasons for having no intent to have their adolescent child vaccinated.

“Understanding the continuum of parental HPV vaccine hesitancy provides opportunities to develop targeted communication strategies to different groups of people and support large-scale HPV vaccine uptake,” the researchers said. “This study observed distinctions in characteristics and reasons associated with three levels of vaccine hesitancy, suggesting the potential to tailor interventions to vaccine-hesitant subgroups.”

Drawing from the 2019 National Immunization Survey—Teen, the researchers examined 13,090 parents of unvaccinated adolescents, of whom 63 percent (n=8,253) said they were hesitant and did not intend to have their child vaccinated in the following year. Parents could be broadly classified into three classes: unsure, somewhat hesitant, or very hesitant.

Of note, most participating parents (63 percent) were very hesitant, while only 29 percent and 8 percent were somewhat hesitant and unsure, respectively. Moreover, parents who had received recommendations from their healthcare provider to have their child vaccinated were significantly less likely to be unsure (adjusted relative risk ratio [aRR], 0.3, 95 percent confidence interval [CI], 0.2–0.4) or somewhat unsure (aRRR, 0.8, 95 percent CI, 0.6–0.9). No such effect was reported for parents who were very hesitant.

Meanwhile, among those who were very or somewhat hesitant, worries about the vaccines’ safety or potential side effects were the most common reasons for not wanting to have their child vaccinated in the next year (30 percent and 20 percent, respectively). Among unsure parents, the most dominant reason for indecision was the absence of provider recommendation (34 percent).