What Works to Get the Elderly Vaccinated Against COVID-19? Experimental Evidence from India

Last registered on May 04, 2021

View Trial History

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title

What Works to Get the Elderly Vaccinated Against COVID-19? Experimental Evidence from India

RCT ID

AEARCTR-0007470

Initial registration date

April 16, 2021

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published

April 16, 2021, 5:57 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated

May 04, 2021, 2:25 PM EDT

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Country

India

Region

Tamil Nadu

Primary Investigator

Name

Esther Duflo

Affiliation

MIT

Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name

Girija Vaidyanathan

PI Affiliation

Government of Tamil Nadu

Contact Investigator

PI Name

Garima Sharma

PI Affiliation

MIT

Contact Investigator

PI Name

Frank Schilbach

PI Affiliation

MIT

Contact Investigator

PI Name

Erin Grela

PI Affiliation

MIT

Contact Investigator

PI Name

Madeline McKelway

PI Affiliation

Stanford

Contact Investigator

PI Name

Abhijit Banerjee

PI Affiliation

MIT

Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status

In development

Start date

2019-02-04

End date

2021-07-01

Keywords

Health

Additional Keywords

COVID-19, vaccination, aging

JEL code(s)

Secondary IDs

ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT04870593

Abstract

COVID-19 poses a substantial risk to elderly populations; understanding how to get elders vaccinated against the virus is therefore a policy priority. We will conduct an experiment with elders in Tamil Nadu, India to evaluate interventions policymakers might use to raise vaccination rates amongst the elderly. The particular interventions we will consider 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 will be 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.

External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation

Banerjee, Abhijit et al. 2021. "What Works to Get the Elderly Vaccinated Against COVID-19? Experimental Evidence from India." AEA RCT Registry. May 04. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.7470-1.1

Sponsors & Partners

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)

Intervention Start Date

2021-04-17

Intervention End Date

2021-05-12

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

Vaccination against COVID-19

Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)

Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

The experiment will be conducted in a sample of elders living in Tamil Nadu, India. These elders are a subsample of elders from an ongoing panel study on aging in Tamil Nadu.

We will assign elders' communities to one of four information campaigns. A subsequent household-level randomization will determine whether individual elders are informed directly. The four information campaigns communities may be assigned are:

(1) Control: we will call the elders assigned to be given information directly, inform them that they are eligible for the vaccine, tell them where they could get it, and address common concerns they might have.

(2) Buddies: we will call the elders assigned to be given information directly and deliver all of the information given in condition (1). In addition, we will encourage a "buddy system," whereby elders are accompanied to the vaccination site by another adult who could also get the vaccine. We will suggest to elders that they have another eligible adult accompany them to the vaccination site, ask elders to think of such an adult, and then call those adults to inform them about the vaccine and encourage them to help the elder get to the vaccination site so they could both be vaccinated.

(3) Gossips: we will call the elders assigned to be given information directly and deliver all of the information given in condition (1). We will also ask elders who in their communities is good at spreading information. We will then call these "gossips" and ask them to tell their communities that elders are eligible to be vaccinated, where vaccinations are given, and other details to address common concerns about the vaccine.

(4) Buddies and gossips: we will call the elders assigned to be given information directly and deliver all of the information given in condition (1). We will then do the same encouragement of the buddy system as in condition (2). In addition, we will ask elders who in their communities is good at spreading information. We will then call these "gossips," ask them to spread the information gossips in condition (3) were asked to spread, and also ask them to encourage their communities to use the buddy system to get elders vaccinated.

As mentioned above, elders in randomly selected households will not be given information directly.

We will call all elders, both those given information directly and those not, in the subsequent weeks to ask if they have been vaccinated.

Experimental Design Details

Randomization Method

Randomization will be done in Stata.

Randomization Unit

Assignment to one of the four information campaigns will be at the community level. Communities will be villages in rural areas and urban blocks in urban areas. The assignment of elders to receive vaccination information directly or not will be at the household level.

Was the treatment clustered?

Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters

385 communities and 2,275 households

Sample size: planned number of observations

3,006 elders

Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms

One-fourth of communities will be assigned to each of the four information campaigns. One-third of households will be assigned to receive no direct information and two-thirds will be assigned to be directly informed.

Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)

Supporting Documents and Materials

IRB