A slight majority of people are not satisfied with the government's handling of the third wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, citing poor communication with the public, confusion and slow acquisition of vaccines, according to an opinion survey by the National Institute of Development Administration, Nida Poll.
The poll was conducted nationwide on May 17-19 and May 27-28, with 1,312 respondents aged 15 and over of various levels of education and occupation.
The purpose was to compile opinions on the third wave of Covid-19 disease and the government's response to it, the pollster said.
In terms of satisfaction with the government's handling of the situation in April-May, 30.49% of respondents said they were not satisfied with the government's slow response and poor communication with the people and the confusion, and it was too slow to acquire vaccines.
Another 22.56% were totally dissatisfied with the actions taken by the government, saying it was incompetent in its vaccine management, resulting in people not being able to make their own choice of vaccine.
On the other side, 12.20% said they were very satisfied with the government's handling of the situation, while 33.31% were fairly satisfied, saying that Covid-19 was a global situation and the government had done its best to get vaccines.
The rest, 1.44%, had no comment or were not interested.
Asked about their decision on vaccination, most respondents - 62.04% - said they would get free vaccines provided by the government; 17.99% would not seek vaccination; 15.93% would seek vaccination at a private hospital which had government permission; 3.73% were still undecided; and, 0.31% would seek vaccination abroad.
Asked which vaccine they would prefer, 30.71% were still undecided; 20.58% AstraZeneca; 19.05% Sinovac; 14.56% Pfizer; 4.57% Moderna; 3.13% Johnson & Johnson; 0.46% Sputnik V; and, 6.94% said they would never seek vaccination.