Why the anti-vaccine movement has an increasing presence and what are the reasons for its distrust

Marcus Lamb, Johann Biacsics, Dmitriy Stuzhuk, Ygona Moura, Tony Tenpenny, Stephen Karanja. Although they lived in different countries, what these people had in common was a distrust of vaccines against coronavirus.

Through their social networks or television programs, they decided to campaign against immunization and, in some cases, recommend alternative ways (such as the chlorine dioxide) to face the pandemic of COVID-19.

The end result: they all passed away from coronavirus.

Are these examples insufficient to convince disbelievers of the efficacy of vaccines against COVID-19? The movement antivacunas gets stronger as the days go by?

Trade consulted with two specialists to answer a central question in the current context:

Information gaps

Evangelina Martich, a doctor in social policy and a consultant in health policies, does not dare to affirm that the anti-vaccine movement it is getting stronger.

In any case, he says, it should first be taken into account that the pandemic gave him more visibility. “But there are people who refuse to be vaccinated specifically against the COVID-19, we could no longer classify them as antivacunas”.

“In fact, many have other vaccines and they have vaccinated their children, so you have to make the distinction”.

Martich notes that, if there is a “an important group of the population that does not want to be immunized” against him coronavirus, it is for three causes.

First: the communication problems of governments.

“That it had to do with the immediacy, the novelty with which it was acting from trial and error, and that with the passing of the weeks more was known”.

“You had to be in the middle all the time, playing with the tension of deciding between alerting the population or transmitting calm. This produced spaces of silence that were filled by disinformation and by movements that began to transmit their messages.”.

Second: the opacity of the pharmaceutical industry model.

“Innovation and development follows an outdated model at a global level, a model that investigates with profit in mind and not necessarily in responding to the health needs of the population.”.

“It is normal that there is distrust towards a model that is not characterized by being transparent”.

To this should be added that, while the speech noted that “the only thing that was going to save us was the vaccine”, it was not clearly explained how they were produced.

“The population knew that vaccines take many years to develop, and in this case they were made in months. It is understandable that people who do not know in detail how this works – they do not have to know, either – distrust”.

“It should have been reported that, in these circumstances, overlapping phases were allowed in clinical investigations and that the investigation did not start from scratch, but collected other previous results”.

Third: the role of political leaders

“There are the openly deniers of the pandemic or antivacunas, What Donald Trump O Jair Bolsonaro, who also raised doubts about the vaccines that we actually know that they work well, that they are safe and effective”.

“These figures must be understood as part of an international context, within the rise of far-right movements, of messianic leaders who arrive to propose magic solutions.”.

Faith in alternative medicine

Raúl Castro, anthropologist and dean of Communication at the Southern Scientific University, he does feel that the anti-vaccine movements have been invigorated, “mainly outside of Peru”.

“The German bloc has quite high degrees of skepticism and reluctance. In Austria, 35% do not want to be vaccinated. The same happens in Germany, where the figure ranges between 30% and 32% ”.

“It is not a question of a population that is not aware and that, to the extent that it is informed, will be convinced. No, it is a citizen bloc that believes in alternative treatments”.

The homeopathy, for instance.

The EFE agency agrees and notes that in Germany “there is between 8 and 10% of the population open to esoteric ideas and with a preference for ‘alternative medicines’, who are influenced by such interpretations when deciding on the vaccine”.

EFE writes: “It is a ‘heterogeneous’ scene, in which followers of homeopathy and anthroposophic beliefs are represented, among many others who distrust’ traditional medicine’”.

According to Castro, studies on the profile of anti-vaccines in Spain and other parts of Europe show that they are not people “who do not want to be vaccinated, but rather want to wait because they do not know what the consequences or side effects are”.

“This information takes us away from the figure of the alienated, from thinking that they have been brainwashed, or that they are elderly people who are victims of disinformation processes or ‘fake news’ “.

In any case, the increase in people who do not want to be vaccinated against the coronavirus also responds to the “Legitimate opinions of the States to guarantee the welfare of the majority”.

“Prohibiting free movement, restricting free access to public places to the unvaccinated, has increased reluctance, rebellion and resistance”.

The Peruvian case, Castro adds, involves other aspects.

“Obviously there is an issue of resources, of little access to vaccines. And, when they are finally at hand, the degree of mistrust due to the counterinformation that comes from power centers plays against”.

There are political parties or former presidents who recommend ivermectin. Everything adds up to generate greater distrust.

“Generalizing, Peru responds to the reality of countries in emergency, whose public information systems are not as widespread as they are in Europe”.

“And by not having rigorous and serious information, the counter-information of groups interested in continuing to play with a popular idiosyncrasy appears”.

No to conspiracy theories

Both Castro and Martich rule out the significant presence of conspiracy theorists among those who do not want to get vaccinated against him coronavirus.

Martich anota:

“There are points of contact between the anti-vaccine movement and these theories -in terms of the speeches and arguments-, but I insist, the people who now oppose the COVID-19 vaccine are not necessarily part of the anti-vaccine movement”.

“Although this is still dangerous and very worrying, the phenomenon responds more to a specific question of the context”.

EFE cites the study by the Berlin Ideas Laboratory Dpart, which shows that “the number of conspiracy theorists who believe the coronavirus doesn’t really exist fell in Germany from 14% in 2020 to 9% in 2021″.

By way of conclusion, Martich proposes to think of two situations that could get out of hand. The first is how much of this whole situation is going to really impact the movement antivacuna to thicken and invigorate it.

And second: “That here we are all saved or no one is saved. The solution is global and has to be supportive”.

“Refusing to be immunized is an attack against the global health of everyone. The clearest example is omicron, the new variant that appeared in South Africa, which puts us on alert. For this reason, I believe that the messages that we are transmitting must be adjusted”.

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