“Using behavioral insights to inform the COVID-19 vaccine response in Kosovo[1]: Population perceptions and interventions”

Abstract

Objective

Understand population perceptions in Kosovo^[1] regarding COVID-19 vaccination to inform the pandemic response.

Methods

Five rounds of a cross-sectional survey in representative samples of adults during 2020–2021. Analysis includes descriptive statistics, hierarchical cluster analysis, segmentation and logistic regressions.

Results

Self-reported intention to vaccinate increased after the introduction of COVID-19 vaccines in Kosovo.^[1] In less than one year, vaccination intentions increased from 36% to 66% of those unvaccinated. Predictors for vaccine intentions included gender, age, trust in health authorities. Segmentation analysis identified population segments that had high vaccine nintentions but low uptake, informing messages and campaign initiatives designed to translate intentions into behavior.

Conclusion

Identifying people's perceptions and behavior is essential to support evidence-based policy making, especially during outbreak response.

Innovation

BI is an innovative focus of research in Kosovo [1] where little BI data had been collected prior, and provided a unique understanding of population views, attitudes and behaviors related to COVID-19. These findings were not only essential for an evidence-based pandemic response but also laid the foundation for future broad application of BI to inform interventions that seek to enable, support and promote health-related behaviurs in Kosovo^[1]