Fear, misinformation, and innumerates: How the Wakefield paper, the press, and advocacy groups damaged the public health

Poland, Gregory A.; Spier, R.E.

doi:10.1016/j.vaccine.2010.02.052

Cited by 134 publications

(71 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…[2][3][4][5][6] Although US MMR vaccination rates for children ages 19 to 35 months exceeded the Healthy People 2020 target of 90% in the 2011 National Immunization Survey, 15 states had rates below that threshold. 7 Some areas have even lower immunization rates owing to clustering of unvaccinated or under-vaccinated children.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effective Messages in Vaccine Promotion: A Randomized Trial

et al. 2014

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OBJECTIVES: To test the effectiveness of messages designed to reduce vaccine misperceptions and increase vaccination rates for measles-mumps-rubella (MMR). METHODS: A Web-based nationally representative 2-wave survey experiment was conducted with 1759 parents age 18 years and older residing in the United States who have children in their household age 17 years or younger (conducted June–July 2011). Parents were randomly assigned to receive 1 of 4 interventions: (1) information explaining the lack of evidence that MMR causes autism from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; (2) textual information about the dangers of the diseases prevented by MMR from the Vaccine Information Statement; (3) images of children who have diseases prevented by the MMR vaccine; (4) a dramatic narrative about an infant who almost died of measles from a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention fact sheet; or to a control group. RESULTS: None of the interventions increased parental intent to vaccinate a future child. Refuting claims of an MMR/autism link successfully reduced misperceptions that vaccines cause autism but nonetheless decreased intent to vaccinate among parents who had the least favorable vaccine attitudes. In addition, images of sick children increased expressed belief in a vaccine/autism link and a dramatic narrative about an infant in danger increased self-reported belief in serious vaccine side effects. CONCLUSIONS: Current public health communications about vaccines may not be effective. For some parents, they may actually increase misperceptions or reduce vaccination intention. Attempts to increase concerns about communicable diseases or correct false claims about vaccines may be especially likely to be counterproductive. More study of pro-vaccine messaging is needed.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effective Messages in Vaccine Promotion: A Randomized Trial

et al. 2014

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“…The majority of studies were conducted in the United Kingdom, France and the Netherlands, with a main focus on the seasonal influenza vaccine, the HPV vaccine and the pandemic influenza vaccine. These characteristics could be a reflection of the presence of research institutes in these countries with relevant research interests but could also be linked to the introduction of and the high number of safety concerns about the HPV vaccine, the poor uptake of H1N1 vaccination during the 2009 pandemic, as well as previous historic vaccination crisis in these countries such as the MMR-autism crisis in the UK [144,155] or the hepatitis Bmultiple sclerosis crisis in France [156]. As no country is safe from a potential decrease of public confidence in vaccination, more robust behavioural research needs to be conducted particularly in countries where fewer studies were identified, such as Eastern Europe.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The benefit of the doubt or doubts over benefits? A systematic literature review of perceived risks of vaccines in European populations

Karafillakis

Larson

2017

Vaccine

250

206

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Findings: A total of 145 articles were selected, most of which were conducted in the UK, the Netherlands and France and studied seasonal influenza, HPV and pandemic influenza vaccination. Across all countries and vaccines, the primary area of concern was vaccine safety, followed by perceptions of low likelihood of contracting vaccine-preventable diseases (VPDs), perceived low severity of VPDs, beliefs that vaccines do not work, and overall lack of information. Concerns were found to be vaccine-, country-and populationspecific. Conclusion: In addition to identifying concerns about vaccination in Europe, this study confirmed the notion that individuals have many safety concerns about vaccination and often believe that the risks of vaccination outweigh their benefits. More research needs to be conducted to explore the impact of different types of communication strategies, which would frame the benefits of vaccination as well as risks of not vaccinating. Strategies to better inform public perceptions of vaccines should include the provision of unbiased, comprehensive information tailored to population information needs, and delivered using multiple and new communication technologies such as social media.

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“…Fear of autism is still today a frequently reported vaccine safety concern among parents in different settings. 54,55 Despite the fact that there are as many causes of hesitancy as there are contexts, we have hypothesized that some factors are playing a key role in the apparent increase of this phenomenon in the developed world. We will look specifically at the roles of media and communication, of public health and vaccine policies and of health professionals.…”

Section: Challenges In Defining Vaccine-hesitancymentioning

confidence: 99%