New York, Dec 15 (IANS): As the US prepares its nationwide vaccination programme, a new survey has revealed that at least 21.3 per cent adults in the country are not planning to get the Covid-19 vaccine shot.

The study, published in the American Journal of Infection Control, examined the psychological and social predictors of US adults' willingness to get a future Covid-19 vaccine and whether these predictors differ under an emergency use authorisation release of the vaccine.

It involved a survey of 788 US adults and found that 59.9 per cent of the respondents were definitely or probably planning to receive a future coronavirus vaccine, while 18.8 per cent were neutral and 21.3 per cent were probably or definitely not planning to get it.

When asked if they would get the vaccine under an emergency use authorisation, 46.9 per cent of the respondents said they were definitely, likely, or somewhat willing to do so; while 53.1 per cent said they were definitely, likely, or somewhat unwilling to do so.

"The biggest issue coming out of this study is that the participants seemed worried about receiving the Covid-19 vaccine under emergency use authorisation," said the study's lead author Jeanine Guidry from the Virginia Commonwealth University in the US.

"We now also know that two of the vaccines -- Pfizer and Moderna -- may have some expected side-effects and that may make people hesitate to get the vaccine," she added.

The study also found troubling disparities among the demographic groups. For example, younger respondents were more likely than older respondents to express willingness to get the vaccine.

The findings showed that significant predictors of willingness to get the coronavirus vaccine included education level and having health insurance, as well as a high-perceived susceptibility to Covid-19.

"Predictors of a willingness to get the vaccine under an emergency use authorization included age and race/ethnicity," the authors noted.