Tackling Vaccine Hesitancy Fuelled by Misinformation, Propaganda

The next major challenge in tackling COVID-19 pandemic appears to be vaccine hesitancy. Several factors bordering mostly on misinformation, false prophecies and propaganda churned out by conspiracy theorists have discouraged people from taking the vaccines. To articulate strategies to counter these fake and negative narratives, the United Nations Children’s Fund recently organised a workshop in Kano. Onyebuchi Ezigbo, who was at the dialogue, reports

Nigeria like most parts of the world has been ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus brought with it panic and desolation amongst people, until scientists rallied to produce vaccines to help eradicate the scourge. However, the arrival of COVID-19 vaccines has thrown up yet another challenge, that of hesitancy by a segment of the populace. Today, while Nigeria is grappling with the challenges of procuring enough COVID-19 vaccine doses for the eligible population, some people are busy disparaging and undermining credible health advisories meant stop the disease scourge.

One major concern is the issue of apathy against the use of the COVID-19 vaccine. The fact that some people are refusing to take the vaccine and at the same time failing to observe the health protocol against infectious disease is a source of worry to all who understands the looming danger posed by such act.

Accordingly, the World Health Organisation (WHO) and UNICEF have cautioned that low vaccination rates might put the country at serious risk of the rampaging COVID-19 variants and may result in otherwise avoidable deaths.

Current vaccination figures in Nigeria is put at about 4,024,704 persons. This figure is a far cry to the projected target of about 70 million that will enable the country to achieve herd immunity to stem the ravaging COVID-19.

What is more worrisome is the fact that this vaccine hesitancy, as it has come to be known in medical parlance, is being fueled mostly by ignorance and mischief. Those who are not well informed about deadly nature of COVID-19 and what they stand to gain by taking protective vaccines are being deceived by a few mischievous ones and conspiracy theorists.

Media Dialogue

Speaking at a two-day Media Dialogue on COVID-19 Vaccine Campaign organised by UNICEF, in collaboration with the Child Rights Bureau of the Federal Ministry of Information (CRiB) to device advocacy measures to be adopted by government, UNICEF Communication Specialist, Mr. Jeffrey Njoku said several misconceptions, conspiracy theories and innuendos being peddled against use of COVID-19 vaccines are unfounded.

For instance, Njoku said there has not been any reported case of serious adverse effect from the COVID-19 vaccine on those that have so taken it in Nigeria. However, Njoku said that it behoves on the authorities and the media to device more effective means of debunking such erroneous postulations. Njoku enjoined government to embark on aggressive media and community advocacy to allay the fears and wrong insinuations about the COVID-19 vaccines so as to encourage people”s participation.

“More awareness is needed to convince people on the efficacy of vaccines as a means of eradicating COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria, thereby encouraging them to take the vaccine jab”, he said.

Speaking on the topic, “Demand Creation on COVID-19 Vaccines” , UNICEF Chief of Field Office, Kano, Maulid Warfa said those who hesitate to take COVID-19 vaccine may have their reason for the hesitancy, even if such reasons are not factual. He said that the media and the community leaders have the role of giving them the right information about the efficacy of the vaccines.

One of the measures to improve vaccine patronage he said, is to debunk the misinformation trailing the current vaccination exercise.

Method of Debunking Misinformation about COVID-19 Vaccine

A University don and the Vice Chancellor of the Federal University, Kashere in Gombe State, Prof. Umar Pate advised that the sensitisation campaign to support the vaccination programme should not be medicalised by allowing only medical professionals to drive the campaign. Pate who spoke in Kano during the workshop said the message also should not be dominated by medical terminologies which will be complex and difficult for people to understand.

He said media professionals should be made to lead the campaign against anti vaccine advocates. Prof. Pate explained that using best communication tools and putting messages in simple, clear and concise manner will win the people over and get them to understand and participate in vaccination.

Pate also advised against allowing the issue to be highly politicised. ” Some politicians will try dabble into the issue and turn it into advantage and start giving it their own interpretations”. He however said that active leadership involvement is needed at all levels to ensure that right messages are sent to the people about the vaccines and it’s benefits. ” If you have quality leadership at every level of governance, then the followership will take the same form and probably correct information will be passed”.

Another aspect of the campaign according to the professor is community engagement. He said vaccine enablers should try to identify and participate in community activities. ” Through these community activities, one will be able to meet different calibre of people, those that are community leaders, opinion leaders, who can listen to you, believe in you and then be able to transmit the messages down to the grassroot”.

Pate said community engagement remains the effective means of getting the people to accept the vaccines. In addition, Pate spoke about importance of good media relations. He said journalists should see himself as leader and somebody who is looked upon as one with the knowledge and credibility of making people to believe in the information he disseminates. The Vice Chancellor urged the authorities in the health sector to form synergy with the media and employ the highly useful communication skills at their disposal to dispel whatever misinformation and false narratives against the application of COVID-19 vaccines in the country.

Understanding the Myth Behind COVID-19 Vaccines

An Immuno-Pharmacology expert, Dr. Murtala Jibril, in his presentation at the media workshop tried to explain some myths surrounding the manufacturing of COVID-19 vaccines. Jibril started by explaining the make-up of the different vaccine types. He said a single vaccine provides 100 per cent protection. According to him, vaccine only helps to fortify an individual to be able to withstand attack of infectious diseases.

He also explained the concept of Herd immunity, saying it had to do with idea of getting substantial population of given place vaccinated so as to weed out the virus. But Jibril said that Herd immunity does not provide full protection to those who are not vaccinated. “It does not provide substantial protection to the unvaccinated”.
While dismissing the wrong belief that vaccine tampers with DNA of individuals, Jibril said: “These vaccines cannot tamper with an individual’s DNA because the DNA and RNA are not even in a similar compartment. It is like you have somebody opening your house and somebody is in your living room. And somebody is in the kitchen and you are saying that somebody in the kitchen will infect somebody in the living room.

“The DNA and RNA are not in the same compartment thus the COVID vaccine cannot alter our DNA and it is only the RNA that is being administered. And it is the RNA that carries the genetic information or the blueprint it ultimately translated by our body to produce the spike protein and it is the spike protein that will now stimulate the immune response and develop antibodies that protect us against the virus.

“Another misconception is that people think that when you get vaccinated it can cause infertility in women. It is not true. There is no similarity between the spike protein and the syncytin protein. We don’t have what is tagged Cross immunogenicity. Getting vaccination with the vaccine cannot produce the antibodies that will attack the syncytin protein.”

Jibril urged Nigerians to take the opportunity of the availability of vaccines in the country to get vaccinated in order to protect themselves, save more lives and reduce the chances of severe disease from the mutant virus. Jibril who is also a vaccine development expert at the Department of Pharmacology & Therapeutics, Bayero University, Kano, debunked rumours that vaccines have damaging impact on the fertility of women, saying that vaccines cannot transmit COVID virus as they are not whole pathogen vaccines.

The doctor explained that the earlier many Nigerians get vaccinated, the faster the country would be able to reduce further spread of the virus and in turn reduce chances of it’s mutating into more variants of the virus.

Amidst concerns over a possible outbreak of the third wave of COVID-19 pandemic, Jibril said that getting many eligible Nigerians to vaccinate will enable us achieve herd immunity and escape the dangers of mutant COVID-19 virus. According to him, the vaccine effectiveness and efficacy of the vaccines tends to reduce. Jibril said with Mordena vaccine now in the country, Nigeria has one of the best vaccines against COVID-19, adding that studies have shown that 3 million lives are saved annually in the world with vaccines.

Essentially, UNICEF Communication expert, Jeffrey Njoku said the aim of the media dialogue session is to stir up some kind of media activism that will shot down the negatives against the use of the COVID-19 vaccine by the populace.

The message UNICEF is conveying is that getting vaccinated will save the lives of many and prevent the country from relapsing into yet another costly health emergency. Also getting a substantial ratio of Nigeria vaccinated is key to getting herd immunity and reducing severe COVID-19 disease in people.