Potential Barriers to Recently Recommended Adolescent Vaccines: Parents' Future Vaccine Decisions and Willingness to Pay

Learning Objectives for this Presentation:
By the end of the presentation participants will be able to describe public willingness to pay for recently recommended adolescent vaccines.

Background:
Increased prices for newly recommended vaccines may induce economic barriers to receipt of these vaccines. Parents' willingness-to-pay (WTP) for MCV, Tdap, and HPV for adolescents provides an opportunity to examine this issue.

Objectives:
To gauge WTP for recently recommended adolescent vaccines and determine the extent to which WTP is associated with future adoption of recommendations for these vaccines.

Methods:
We recruited a nationally representative sample of households with children via a Web-enabled survey in Nov-Dec, 2006. Parents of children aged 9-18 years were asked whether they plan to have their children receive MCV, Tdap, and HPV vaccines within 5 years. If yes parents were categorized as “adopters”. Parents who responded that they needed more information before a decision could be made were categorized as such. “Adopters” and those who “need more information” were asked to indicate their WTP for each of the vaccine (series). Multivariate regression analyses were used to examine whether WTP for MCV, Tdap, and HPV was associated with adoption, adjusted for sociodemographic factors.

Results:
Response rate was 73% (n=1,410). Higher proportions of parents (37%-45%) were in the “need more information” group than in the “adopters” (19%-37%) group for each vaccine. For “adopters,” mean WTP was: MCV=$76, Tdap=$59 and HPV=$223. For “need more information,” mean WTP was: MCV=$49, Tdap=$41 and HPV=$99. Adjusted for parents' age, sex, income, and education, WTP was significantly higher for “adopters” versus parents who “need more information” (p<.05) for all 3 vaccines.

Conclusions:
WTP for Tdap was fairly consistent with vaccine cost in the private sector. However, the WTP for MCV and HPV was substantially lower than private sector cost. This gap may present barriers to uptake of these vaccines, especially for the “need more information” group.