Only half of Tennessee parents are likely to get the COVID-19 vaccine for their child, Vanderbilt poll finds

Despite the ongoing coronavirus surge, nearly half of Tennessee parents are unlikely to vaccinate their children for COVID-19, according to a new Vanderbilt poll. 

The Vanderbilt Child Health Poll recently asked a statewide sample of Tennessee parents about whether their family wears masks or face coverings when they leave home and their plans to vaccinate against COVID-19 and influenza.

About 53% of parents reported that they are likely or very likely to get the COVID-19 vaccine for their child, though about 64% said they were likely to vaccinate their child for the flu. 

The survey also found that Hispanic parents are more likely to vaccinate their children against COVID-19, with 61% reporting they likely would get the vaccine for their child, compared to 54% of white parents and 44% of Black parents.

RELATED:Why Tennessee schoolchildren won't be required to get a COVID-19 vaccine

Dr. Stephen Patrick, director of the Vanderbilt Center for Child Health Policy, which conducted the poll, said the survey's findings are striking. 

"I hope this is a wake-up call for all of us in public health that we need to take steps right now to build trust in the process," Patrick said. "We think it's likely that in the next year we'll have COVID-19 vaccines for children, and it's going to be an important step to getting students back to their routines, back to their schools and to mitigating community spread of the coronavirus."

Tennessee expects to receive about 56,000 doses of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine later this month, but only frontline health care workers and first responders are likely to get the vaccine anytime soon, according to the state's revised vaccination plan.

As more vaccines are approved for adults, though, studies are already underway for children. Parents surveyed were asked if they would get the COVID-19 vaccine for their child if a safe and effective one was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in the next 12 months.

MORE:Who gets the COVID-19 vaccine first? Tennessee has a plan.

Many educators also argue that widespread vaccination is needed before it is safe for schools to reopen, but Gov. Bill Lee has made it clear he won't mandate children be vaccinated for COVID-19 to attend school.

At a Nov. 24 briefing, Lee and members of his administration acknowledged the vaccine will help mitigate the spread of the virus across the state but characterized vaccines as a "choice."

Only about half of Tennessee parents report wearing masks

The Vanderbilt Child Health Poll results also found that only about 57% of parents report wearing masks or face coverings every time they leave the home, though 68% of parents surveyed believe that wearing a mask is important for children. 

Tennessee never has issued a statewide mask mandate, instead allowing county mayors and individual communities to implement and enforce their own local mandates.

Masks aren't universally required in all Tennessee schools that are open either, and some school districts have faced backlash with parents even threatening lawsuits when they instituted mask requirements for students and teachers.

A November Vanderbilt research report found that coronavirus death rates have been twice as high in Tennessee counties that do not require residents to wear masks compared to counties that do. 

COVID-19 IN SCHOOLS:Tennessee school districts are now using rapid COVID-19 tests to test staff and eventually, students

But half of the parents surveyed in this recent poll agreed they would be more likely to wear a mask if there was a state mandate.

A much larger portion of Black parents – 73% – report wearing masks, compared to 52% of white parents, and 79% of Black parents say they believe mask-wearing is important for children, compared to 65% of white parents.

Black, Hispanic and other members of marginalized racial or ethnic groups are among the Americans who are getting infected and dying at disproportionately higher rates than white residents, in part because of greater likelihoods of members of these groups being essential workers, living in multi-generational homes or not having access to health care, Vanderbilt research has found. 

Who do parents trust for information?

The Vanderbilt poll also reports that most parents trust their child's own health care provider for information about COVID-19 and vaccines above other sources of information, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Tennessee Department of Health and research studies. 

These findings varied across race and ethnicity. For 46% of Hispanic parents, their child's health care provider is their highest-rated source of information, compared to the 44% of Black parents, who rate the state health department as their go-to for COVID-19 information.

White parents are more evenly split, but 39% rated research studies as their highest-rated source of information.

MORE:COVID-19 vaccines in Tennessee: You've got questions. We have answers.

But one in five parents indicated that they don't trust any of these sources for information about the COVID-19 vaccination, Patrick noted. 

"This is really a call for all of us to realize that as we think about the next steps in the pandemic, it's important that we begin building trust," he said. "I think when we reflect on 2020 we have felt isolated and a little less together as Tennesseans, but the truth is we are really all in this together." 

The poll, conducted from Oct. 2 to Nov. 9, surveyed 1,066 Tennesseans. It has a margin of error of plus or minus four percentage points. 

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Meghan Mangrum covers education in Nashville for the USA TODAY NETWORK — Tennessee. Contact her at mmangrum@tennessean.com. Follow her on Twitter @memangrum.