site.btaPoll Shows Increase in People Willing to Get COVID Vaccine

Sofia, March 10 (BTA) - A nationally representative survey shows
 that a growing number of Bulgarians are willing to be
vaccinated for the novel coronavirus. The poll was taken by
Gallup International Balkan among 1,008 interviewees between
February 22 and March 1, and is part of surveys outlining the
picture at the beginning of each month.

Compared to the beginning of January and the beginning of
February, when 27 per cent wanted the anti-Covid-19 jab against
48 per cent who did not, now 36 per cent declare they want to be
 vaccinated with 41 per cent in the negative, closing the gap in
 favour of those who opt to get inoculated. The elderly want the
 vaccine the most. The share of those who are not sure is also
diminishing, dropping from 24 before to 20 per cent now. Three
per cent answered they had already been vaccinated.

The activization of the vaccination campaign demonstrated
through media has some result. This, of course, is still far
from the best and the obvious problems in the process are quite
a few, analysts comment. They point out that part of the
reluctance comes from the fact that even a month ago at least
1.5 million people - of a total of 5.2 million adult Bulgarians
permanently living in this country - had already had the virus.
Now the number of those who have is tangibly larger.

Society is getting increasingly impatient about the lifting of
the restrictions. This may also be due to the fact that at the
time the poll was being conducted, the authorities spoke rather
soothingly, Gallup says. That is why, most Bulgarians say
measures should be increasingly lighter on principle. At the
beginning of March 55 per cent were for lighter measures on
principle and 32 per cent, for stricter ones. The rest of the
respondents were hesitant.

The attitude to the measures depends on the overall situation
with the number of cases in the country and the talking about
these. The more the cases, the more fearful people are: with the
 escalation of tension in hospitals and ICUs the public comes to
 the idea of harder measures by itself.

Measures approved, authorities criticized

The analysts say that, probably also because of the liberal
regime in Bulgaria, the opinion of the way in which Bulgaria is
coping with COVID-19 remains rather favourable. Forty-six per
cent say Bulgaria is coping well and 42 per cent - that it is
not. There are some who cannot decide.

The favourable attitude to the executive regarding the
coronavirus, however, does not transfer directly on its general
political image, Gallup notes, adding that, when they think
about politics and economy, not about the virus, Bulgarians are
quite critical of their operational power. This criticism is
mainly aimed at the executive, while the President has kept the
role of counterpoint so far.

For several years now, President Rumen Radev has been with a
positive personal rating (confidence minus non-confidence).
According to Gallup, for some time now, he has also been the
only such figure in Bulgaria and practically all other popular
political figures in the country have a negative rating. Radev's
 rating is currently +24. The institutional rating of the
Presidency follows an identical curve.

The Chair of Parliament, Tsveta Karayancheva, gets 17 per cent
confidence, but a general rating of -51.

Prime Minister Boyko Borissov gets 23 per cent confidence and a
rating of -41, but still Borissov is completing his third
mandate as one of the political figures liked in Bulgaria.

Confidence in the national coronavirus task force fluctuates
with the virus waves - faith in the task force is high when fear
 is great. In the last month, 46 per cent responded with "yes"
to the question whether they believed in the task force and 35
per cent said "no".

The conclusion of the past year shows that the summary image of
the health authorities in Bulgaria is rather good, maybe also
because they are seen as somewhat distant from politics, Gallup
comments. It is a fact, however, that Bulgarians traditionally
believe in "alternative" stories on the subject, as a number of
studies in time have shown, the analysts note. /LN/BR