Perception and Awareness Towards Malaria Vaccine Policy Implementation in Nigeria by Health Policy Actors

Abstract

Abstract Background of study: The study aimed to assess perception and awareness of health policy actors on malaria vaccine policy implementation in Nigeria. A descriptive study was conducted to assess opinions and perception of policy actors on implementation of a vaccine program against malaria in Nigeria. Descriptive statistics were carried out to study the characteristics of the population and the univariate analysis of the responses to the questions raised to the participants. Multinomial logistic regression was conducted to evaluate the association between demographic characteristics and the responses. Results: The study revealed that the malaria vaccine awareness was poor with only 48.9% of the policy actors who have previous knowledge of malaria vaccine. Majority of participants (67.8%) declared that they are aware of the importance of vaccine policy in the efforts on tackling the diseases transmission. The more the year of work experience of the participants increases, the odds of being more likely to be aware of the malaria vaccine increases [OR 2.491 (1.183–5.250), p-value < 0.05]. Conclusion: It is recommended that policy makers develop methods of educating populations and increase the awareness on the acceptability of the vaccine and ensure that an affordable malaria vaccine program is implemented in the population.