Caregiver political affiliation is associated with childhood vaccine hesitancy but not fluoride opposition.

OBJECTIVE

Evaluate political affiliation as a correlate of childhood vaccine hesitancy and opposition to topical fluoride and community water fluoridation (CWF).

METHODS

Data were collected from caregivers using an online REDCap questionnaire administered to 1,049 caregivers at five university- or children's hospital-based clinics in four states and via social media between November 2020 and September 2021. We assessed caregivers' political affiliation, childhood vaccine hesitancy, topical fluoride opposition, and CWF opposition. Confounder-adjusted logistic regression models evaluated associations between political affiliation and the three prevention outcomes.

RESULTS

A total of 833 surveys were analyzed. Participants were mostly women (79.5%) with a mean age of 41 years (SD = 8). Most caregivers had a college degree or higher (87.4%), and 36.0% reported an annual household income >$100,000. The prevalence of caregivers' childhood vaccine hesitancy was 40.9%. About 37.2% and 37.7% of caregivers were opposed to topical fluoride and CWF, respectively. In the confounder-adjusted regression model, political affiliation was significantly associated with caregiver childhood vaccine hesitancy, whereby conservative caregivers reported higher odds of childhood vaccine hesitancy than moderate and liberal caregivers (moderate: OR = 0.54, 95% CI: 0.33-0.87; liberal: OR = 0.51, 95% CI: 0.30-0.85). Caregivers' political affiliation was not significantly associated with opposition to topical fluoride or CWF (p-values>0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

Conservative caregivers were more likely to be hesitant about childhood vaccines. Political affiliation was not significantly associated with opposition to topical fluoride or CWF. Our findings suggest that political affiliation has differential influences on various modes of childhood disease prevention.