Researchers are working to decrease the patient discomfort experienced during vaccination. Fear of needles is common worldwide and is more predictive of vaccine hesitancy than education level. According to some estimates, in the United States alone, between 11.5 and 66 million adults are afraid of needles, and that can contribute to low vaccination rates for diseases like COVID-19.Microneedles “have much smaller diameters compared to conventional syringe needles,” writes Hyungil Jung, one of the study’s co-authors. “Usually, 22-to-25-gauge needles are used for vaccination, which have 500 to 700 µm diameters.