SAFETY OF VACCINE A DETERMINANT OF UTILIZATION OF COVID-19 VACCINES AMONG ACADEMIC STAFF OF COLLEGES OF EDUCATION IN NORTHERN STATES, NIGERIA

The purpose of this study was to assess the safety of vaccines as a determinant of the utilization of COVID-19 vaccines among colleges of education academic staff in Northern States, Nigeria. To achieve the purpose of the study, one research question and hypothesis were formulated and tested for the study. The research design for this study was ex post facto research design. The target population for this study comprised 4,947 academic staff of the twelve Colleges of Education in the Northern States of Nigeria. Therefore, the sample for this study consists of 650 academic staff which were selected among colleges of education academic staff in Northern States, Nigeria by using multi stage sampling techniques. The instrument used for data collection was a researcher-developed close-ended questionnaire which was validated by five experts in the Department of Human Kinetics and Health Education, Public Health and Nursing Science at Ahmadu Bello University Zaria with a reliability coefficient of 0.80. Descriptive statistics of frequencies and percentages were used to describe the demographic information of the respondents; means and standard deviations to answer the research question, and inferential statistics of one-sample t-test was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The study findings revealed that the safety of the vaccine is a significant determinant of COVID-19 vaccine utilisation among academic staff of Colleges of Education in Northern Nigeria (t=115.134, P=0.000). Based on the findings of the study it was concluded that; the safety of the vaccine determines the utilization of the COVID-19 vaccine among the academic staff of the College of Education in Northern States, Nigeria. It was therefore recommended that FGN and NGOs should sensitize the general public on the safety of vaccines through symposiums, lectures, drama, seminars and magazines this will help in correcting misconceptions and improve the rate of utilization of the vaccines among colleges of education academic staff in the northern states, Nigeria.