Aging, Covid19
Conditions
Brief summary
COVID-19 poses a substantial risk to elderly populations; understanding how to get elders vaccinated against the virus is therefore a policy priority. An experiment with elders in Tamil Nadu, India will be used to evaluate interventions policymakers might use to raise vaccination rates amongst the elderly. The particular interventions being tested are: calling elders to inform them about vaccination; encouragement of a buddy system, whereby elders are accompanied to the vaccination site by another adult who could also get the vaccine; and seeding vaccination information with gossips, individuals who elders identify as being good at spreading information in the elders' communities. The interventions are phone-based, and can be implemented quickly and at low cost. This makes them promising strategies the Tamil Nadu government and other governments could use to vaccinate elderly populations against COVID-19.
Interventions
BEHAVIORALInformation
Elder informed about vaccination.
BEHAVIORALBuddy
Elder encouraged to get vaccinated using buddy system, whereby he/she is accompanied to the vaccination site by another adult who could also get the vaccine. A potential buddy also given vaccination information and encouraged to help the elder get to the vaccination site so they could both be vaccinated.
BEHAVIORALGossip intervention
Members of elder's community asked who in the community is good at spreading information. These gossips then asked to spread information about vaccination of elders. If buddy intervention assigned in community, gossips also asked to encourage their communities to use the buddy system to get elders vaccinated.
BEHAVIORALInformation assigned in community
Information intervention assigned for other elders in community.
BEHAVIORALBuddy assigned in community
Buddy intervention assigned for other elders in community.
Sponsors
National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
Study design
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
OTHER
Masking
NONE
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
55 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
* At least 55 years of age * Has phone number
Exclusion criteria
\- Not part of the experiments registered under protocol IDs 223749 or 172020
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Received at least one shot | 8 weeks after intervention | Elders asked on phone call if they have received zero, one, or two doses of COVID-19 vaccine. Outcome takes the value of 1 if they received at least one shot, and 0 otherwise. |
| Received two shots | 8 weeks after intervention | Elders asked on phone call if they have received zero, one, or two doses of COVID-19 vaccine. Outcome takes the value of 1 if they received two shots, and 0 otherwise. |
Countries
India
Outcome results
None listed