Right-wing populism in Poland and anti-vaccine myths on YouTube: Political and cultural threats to public health

Żuk, Piotr; Żuk, Paweł

doi:10.1080/17441692.2020.1718733

Cited by 50 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 47 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…In France, the supporters of the far-right National Rally (NR) and the left-wing populist “Unsubmissive France” (“La France Insoumise,” LFI) reject a vaccine against COVID-19. Indeed, Ward et al ( 2020 ) find that French who feel close to the established parties on the center-left, the center and the center-right would opt to be vaccinated against COVID-19, whereas people who identify with the far-left and the far-right parties or who do not identify with any party would reject such a vaccine (see Żuk & Żuk, 2020 for a similar result for Poland). While Cadeddu et al ( 2020 ) find that Italians who place themselves to the right of the ideological left–right spectrum tend to consider vaccines harmful, Engin and Vezzoni ( 2020 ), by contrast, do not find an impact of political conservatism on anti-vaccination beliefs in Italy; rather, trust in political institutions and the healthcare system has a strong impact on attitudes toward vaccination.…”

Section: Ideological Orientation and Skepticism Of Vaccinationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Political ideology and vaccination willingness: implications for policy design

Debus

Tosun

2021

Policy Sci

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced governments to impose major restrictions on individual freedom in order to stop the spread of the virus. With the successful development of a vaccine, these restrictions are likely to become obsolete—on the condition that people get vaccinated. However, parts of the population have reservations against vaccination. While this is not a recent phenomenon, it might prove a critical one in the context of current attempts to manage the COVID-19 pandemic. Consequently, the task of designing policies suitable for attaining high levels of vaccination deserves enhanced attention. In this study, we use data from the Eurobarometer survey fielded in March 2019. They show that 39% of Europeans consider vaccines to cause the diseases which they should protect against, that 50% believe vaccines have serious side effects, that 32% think that vaccines weaken the immune system, and that 10% do not believe vaccines are tested rigorously before authorization. We find that—even when controlling for important individual-level factors—ideological extremism on both ends of the spectrum explains skepticism of vaccination. We conclude that policymakers must either politicize the issue or form broad alliances among parties and societal groups in order to increase trust in and public support for the vaccines in general and for vaccines against COVID-19 in particular, since the latter were developed in a very short time period and resulted—in particular in case of the AstraZeneca vaccine—in reservations because of the effectiveness and side effects of the new vaccines.

show abstract

Section: Ideological Orientation and Skepticism Of Vaccinationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Political ideology and vaccination willingness: implications for policy design

Debus

Tosun

2021

Policy Sci

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In fact, research suggests that the issue of vaccination is strongly politicized and distrust is actively being sown ( 26 ). Among others, medical and vaccine-related conspiracy theories ( 27 ) are undermining trust in science and health authorities ( 28 ). Populist party leaders, in particular, have been argued to try to profit from said politicization ( 29 ), making use of a vocabulary of “medical populism,” ranging from a simplification of the pandemic to being a source of misinformation ( 30 , 31 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Policy-Relevant Attitudes Toward COVID-19 Vaccination: Associations With Demography, Health Risk, and Social and Political Factors

Eberl

Partheymüller

2021

Front. Public Health

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background: Vaccination is considered to be a key public health intervention to end the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, the success of the intervention is contingent on attitudes toward vaccination and the design of vaccination policies.Methods: We conduct cross-sectional analyses of policy-relevant attitudes toward COVID-19 vaccination using survey data of a representative sample of Austrian residents collected by the Austrian Corona Panel Project (ACPP). As outcomes, we examine the individual readiness to get vaccinated, the support for compulsory vaccinations, and the preference for making the vaccine available free of charge. The independent variables include demographics, objective and perceived health risks, and social and political factors.Results: Although there is broad public support for making the vaccine available free of charge, vaccine hesitancy and the opposition to a vaccine mandate are widespread. The protective function of the vaccine for the individual only motivates limited support for vaccinations. Opposition to COVID-19 vaccination also stems from a lack of sense of community and an ongoing politicization of the issue through conspiracy theories and party politics.Conclusion: We propose that overcoming the inherent free-rider problem of achieving sufficiently high vaccination rates poses a potential dilemma for policymakers: Given the politicized nature of the issue, they may find themselves having to choose between making vaccinations compulsory at political costs and a lingering pandemic at high costs for public health and the economy. We propose that promoting a sense of community and addressing potential practical constraints will be key in designing an effective COVID-19 vaccination policy.

show abstract

“…These groups are especially hardly able to properly estimate the risk-benefit ratio related to vaccination, so reaching them and providing information will be a key influencing factor. Moreover, some topics and concerns based on other vaccination programs [30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] and COVID-19 vaccine [5,[39][40][41] have been preliminarily mapped.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%