Few unvaccinated Americans willing to get Johnson & Johnson vaccine: poll

Few Americans who have not been vaccinated against the coronavirus say they are willing to take the Johnson & Johnson vaccine following the temporary pause in its distribution due to rare blood clots. 

Just 22 percent of unvaccinated Americans in a Washington Post-ABC News poll released Monday said that they would be willing to get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Almost three in four — 73 percent — said they were unwilling. 

Slightly fewer than half of all the adults surveyed also said they consider the Johnson & Johnson vaccine very or somewhat safe.

Additionally, more than 7 in 10 respondents say they regard each of the other two vaccines that have been approved by the federal government, one by Moderna and another by Pfizer, to be very or somewhat safe.

Federal health officials late last week lifted a recommended pause in the administration of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine following a handful of severe blood clotting issues reported in some women. Fewer than 20 cases were reported amid millions of single-shot doses that have already been administered. 

On Sunday, Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious diseases expert, said he did not think the brief pause would negatively impact the public’s willingness to get vaccinated. 

“I think, in the long run, what we’re going to see, and we’ll probably see it soon, is that people will realize that we take safety very seriously,” Fauci said on ABC’s “This Week.” “We’re out there trying to combat the degree of vaccine hesitancy that still is out there. And one of the real reasons why people have hesitancy is concern about the safety of the vaccine.”

Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes for Health, on Sunday called the Johnson & Johnson vaccine blood clotting issues “an extremely rare event.” 

“I think she’s in the minority compared to the decision that was put forward by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices of [the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention], which met for an entire day on Friday and went over all of the data, documenting a total of some 13 cases of this rare form of blood clotting out of some 8 million doses of the J&J vaccine that had been administered,” Collins said of a CNN health contributor and former health commissioner who called for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine not to be administered to any women under the age of 65. 

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine will now be accompanied by a “new warning on its label about the remote possibility of the dangerous blood clots,” the Post noted.