A study on acceptability of BCG vaccination, through specialised technicians in a population of 8350 residing in 8 villages of Channapatna taluk of Bangalore district, was carried out by National Tuberculosis Institute. Of the 1106 households satisfactorily interviewed, 956 (86.4%) had at least one child eligible for vaccination. For the purpose of analysis they were classified into three groups. Group I consisted of 312 (32.6%) households in which all children were vaccinated, Group II 270 (28.2%) where non-e of the children were vaccinated and Group III 374 (39.2%) households where only some of their children were vaccinated. Overall vaccination coverage was 52.7% with a range of 33.9% to 79.3%.

The reasons for refusing vaccination were studied. The caste, occupation, education etc., of the household did not have any influence on the refusals. When analysed according to the knowledge and opinion about vaccination it was observed that 55.9% of the children were not vaccinated because of the lack of knowledge in the group where no child was vaccinated. Even when 42% had favourable opinion about vaccination, 52% of the households did not vaccinate any of their children. The refusals were mainly due to (i) absence from the village on the day of vaccination, (ii) fear of prick. Among households where there was unfavourable opinion, all had refused due to fear. The reasons for accepting BCG vaccination were (i) the vaccination was done in the school and hence there was no option for the parents to accept or refuse, (ii) parents felt that the vaccination was good for children, (iii) parents knew that it would prevent TB.