Pediatric Vaccine Hesitancy Fueled By Social Media: NJ Professor

NEW JERSEY — Medical and public health experts may take to social media to quell what one New Jersey public health professional calls “misinformation and disinformation” that has sparked COVID-19 pediatric vaccine hesitancy.

Dr. Corey Basch, a William Paterson University Professor and Chair of the Public Health Department, who received her “postdoctoral training in the Department of Epidemiology at Columbia University, with a specialization in cancer-related population science,” according to her university bio, spoke to NJSpotlight recently about this topic.

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During the interview, New Jersey’s parents were broken down into three categories by NJSpotlight about their views of pediatric COVID vaccines, including:

• Those who are eager to have their 5-11 year old kids vaccinated.
• Those who are hesitant about the vaccine for kids ages 5-11.
• Those who say they will never have their children vaccinated.

Basch attributed the hesitancy in general about pediatric vaccines to “misinformation” hitting social media, similar, she said, to what has happened with COVID vaccines for adults.

“It’s almost impossible to control it,” Basch told NJSpotlight, about the posts, which she said tend to be shared by those heavily opposed to the vaccine, who are sharing “anecdotal stories,” and “graphic testimonials and pictures,” which she said, “tend to be unverifiable,” to social media fact checkers.

Previous Academic Papers Published On Social Media Impacts

Basch's academic papers on the topic, according to her Google Scholar profile, have been addressing social media's impact on vaccine hesitancy, over the past few years.

In 2017, she focused on YouTube, referring to it as an "unregulated social network," claiming there's a "significant" amount of misinformation that exists on that platform.

In her study, she said 87 percent of the most popular YouTube videos with the keywords "vaccine safety" and "vaccines and children" were analyzed. The views on those videos at the time ranged between 25,532 and more than 6.2 million, with the median number just over 62,000 views. Of the video sources, Basch said 27.6 percent were posted by consumers, 26.4 percent from "TV-based or Internet-based news" and 25.3 percent from medical professionals. She described 65.5 percent as "discouraging the use of vaccines," in those categories. "Autism casualty" made up 47.1 percent, "undisclosed or poorly understood risks" were topics in 42.5 percent of the videos, according to Basch. Adverse reactions were addressed in 4o.2 percent she said, with 36.8 percent of the videos discussing the presence of mercury or thimerosol in vaccines.

One of her papers since COVID-19's arrival covered the topic of vaccine decision-making; and showed an uptick on YouTube in videos showing fear about vaccines, increased from six to 20 videos, as of December 2020. The study also noted an increase in videos about "vaccine ineffectiveness" and "adverse reactions." In 2020 the number of videos about vaccine ineffectiveness jumped from six to 25, Basch's paper said, rising from six million views in July 2020 to more than 12 million views in December 2020. On the adverse reaction topic, the content tripled in the time period from July through December 2020, from 11 videos with 6.5 million views to 31 videos with 15.7 million views. The study concluded the "potentially inaccurate and negative influence social media can have on population-wide vaccine uptake," needs to be addressed by health agencies worldwide.

YouTube has updated its guidelines since the COVID pandemic.

She additionally honed in on memes on TikTok in a 2021 paper, which she said have caused an increase in COVID "vaccine hesitancy," studying 100 videos on the platform, with 35 million views in total. She wrote that 36 TikTok videos that encouraged vaccination had 50 percent of the cumulative views and less than 50 percent of the "likes" of all videos in the study. On the other hand, of 38 videos against the COVID vaccine on TikTok, 25 videos or more than 65 percent showed what she called a "parody of an adverse reaction," with 71 percent of the views attributed to these videos. In 22 of the videos discouraging vaccination or almost 58 percent studied, she said a vaccine was discussed that was not yet available at the time of the study. Overall, she described the anti-vaccination video content studied on TikTok as something that "may undermine efforts to ensure widespread uptake of the various COVID-19 vaccines," especially in the young viewers who use the platform more frequently than older viewers.

Basch's Take On "Widespread" Social Media Access About Pediatric Vaccination

“There’s been a lot of damage that’s been done,” Basch said to NJSpotlight of the social media activity on the COVID-19 pediatric vaccines, “because the access is so widespread and so many people have seen these stories already.”

Though Basch couldn’t cite specific story examples during her interviews, she said common scenarios found online that she claimed are disproved, include videos of children who haven’t been able to function post-vaccination, which she said fact checkers have found to be “generally anecdotal.”

However, Basch backpedaled slightly during her interview and said it’s still “not impossible that a child could have side effects like an adult could,” after receiving a COVID vaccination.

Basch said public health officials are encouraging parents to consult with their child’s pediatrician for information about the vaccine, “to make informed decisions rather than turning to places like social media,” she told NJSpotlight, which she said, “we know are filled with unverifiable accounts.”

She blamed these social media stories for “pushing people at a time when they’re feeling very sensitive and are very vulnerable and worn out from the pandemic.”

NJSpotlight asked Basch how parents can receive “tangible, safe advice” to their pediatric vaccination questions. Basch said in the future, parents may see more doctors and public health professionals on social media, who are trying to find the best route to increase their presence on these platforms to “negate a lot of the negative misinformation and disinformation that is so prevalent on the platforms and that spreads so incredibly quickly.”

Once this information spreads, it’s so difficult, it makes our job almost insurmountable to backtrack and negates all of these accounts that need to be disproven,” Basch said.

Watch her full interview below with NJSpotlight:

Editor's Note: This article has been updated to clarify that NJSpotlight categorized the breakdown of parents during the interview, as well as the hesitancy about pediatric vaccines stretching beyond New Jersey parents. It has also been updated to reflect the COVID guideline changes on YouTube.

Questions or comments about this story? Have a news tip? Contact me at: jennifer.miller@patch.com.