Popular Attitudes Towards the Distribution of Vaccines Against COVID-19: The Swiss Case

Abstract

With the arrival of vaccines against the novel coronavirus in late 2020, the issue of how vaccines should be distributed and which groups should be prioritized has become salient. We study popular attitudes toward the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and how these have changed over the course of the pandemic in Switzerland, drawing on data from two rounds of an original public opinion survey conducted in the spring and winter of 2020. We find that the public supports prioritizing vulnerable groups such as health care workers or the elderly. We also find a notable degree of cross-generational solidarity: younger age cohorts prioritize the elderly, while older groups prioritize (typically younger) health care workers. We then examine whether this finding is not in fact driven by vaccine hesitancy. This is not the case for older age groups, whose solidarity thus seems to be genuine. Vaccine hesitancy is an issue among younger groups, however.