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Social Media Propagates Negative Information About Immunization & nbsp | & nbspPhoto credit: & nbspIANS
London: Negative messages about vaccines on social media are the biggest obstacle to vaccination, according to a report by the UK-based Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH). The report, entitled Moving the Needle, identified two in five parents (41%), saying they were often or sometimes exposed to negative messages about vaccines in social media. This percentage increased to one in two (50%) among parents of children under five.
Traditional media, on the other hand, continued to exert influence and health professionals pointed out that this had an impact on public opinion about vaccines. Fear of the side effects of vaccines was the main reason for choosing not to vaccinate, while lack of confidence in the effectiveness of the vaccine was the main reason why parents chose not to vaccinate their children against influenza , says the report.
"Fear and misinformation about vaccines can cause significant damage to seemingly stable immunization programs," said Shirley Cramer, Executive Director of RSPH. "With the advent of social media, information – and misinformation – about vaccines can spread farther and faster than ever and this may, unfortunately, be of benefit to anti-vaccination groups," Cramer added. .
The report also called on social media platforms and the press to fight more against "false information", with millions of lives saved by vaccination and side effects being rare. He suggested that efforts to limit misinformation about health online and via social media should be intensified, especially by the social media platforms themselves.
Vaccine education in schools should be strengthened and improved. Access to vaccines needs to be improved and offered in more places, including in department stores, using all public health staff.
The report is based on the results of surveys of nearly 5,000 people across the UK on their knowledge and attitudes towards vaccines, such as MMR vaccine, influenza vaccine and HPV. They include 2,600 parents, 2,000 other adults and more than 200 health professionals, such as nurses, pharmacists and general practitioners.
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