U.S. women not getting vaccinations

A recent survey found a majority of adult women in the United States do not believe they are up to date on vaccinations that protect against preventable diseases.

Rite Aid and the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases (NFID) sponsored the survey. It included responses from 1,000 randomly selected U.S. adult women age 26-74.

Walgreens launches weekly flu index

Seven out of 10 survey respondents said they’d received at least one vaccination in the past five years, most commonly the flu and tetanus vaccines. But when asked about other common vaccines, most of the women said they were not up to date.

"At a time when vaccine-preventable diseases like flu, shingles, whooping cough, and measles are highly visible in the media around the country, this survey supports what we as community pharmacists already knew–that there is clearly a need to educate consumers and raise awareness about the importance of vaccinations," said Robert Thompson, Rite Aid’s executive vice president of pharmacy.  

Forty-four percent of the respondents said they viewed flu as a serious threat, yet 49% of respondents said they did not plan to get a flu shot in the next five years.

Nearly 80% of survey respondents said they would find an immunization evaluation from a pharmacy helpful. "Education and prevention are central to the NFID mission," said Marla Dalton, NFID’s executive director. "According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, up to 50,000 adults die from vaccine-preventable diseases in the U.S. every year. It is important for adults to understand which vaccines are recommended for them and when. Any tool that helps consumers in this process is a valuable asset to public health."  

Rite Aid has introduced an immunization assessment tool through which customers can complete immunization evaluations, track their immunization history, and find other educational resources on immunizations. 

"Our new immunization assessment tool puts important resources like vaccine recommendations, information about vaccine-preventable diseases, and immunization records right at the fingertips of consumers, helping them to make important healthcare decisions for themselves and their families, now and in the future," Thompson said.

Rite Aid