There was a huge social media outburst here in August claiming 5 people died of covid Vaccine in Tarlac.

Rappler report here.

The problem? It wasn't true. Not only wasn't it true, but the vaccine hadn't been used yet anywhere in the Philippines.

A more recent report (Oct 5) from AFP in the Japanese Times notes that not only is this disinformation about a vaccine that hasn't been used, but that the Anti Vax movement here in the Philippines is killing children.

The background of the problem? The Dengue vaccine scandal where an unproven vaccine caused several deaths  in children.

The problem? The children were not properly screened, and should never have received the vaccine. 

And the outrage was made worse because a lot of folks think corruption might have allowed an unsafe vaccine be used, and that the western drug company was using the Philippine people as a guinea pig.

but it wasn't the vaccine that killed a lot of kids: It was the fact that the well publicized "scandal" scared a lot of parents, so they didn't get their kids vaccinated against anything.

Childhood immunization rates have plummeted in the country — from 87 percent in 2014 to 68 percent — resulting in a measles epidemic and the re-emergence of polio last year. A highly politicized campaign that led to the withdrawal of dengue vaccine Dengvaxia in 2017 is widely seen as one of the main drivers of the fall.

as a result, as the UK Guardian reported, over 70 childen died from measles. 

(Ironically that Dengue vaccine is 76% effective, and the vaccine has since been approved for use in other countries.).

Fast forward to Covid, where the opposition to Trump, not scientific data, seems to be fueling Anti covid vaccine hysteria in the USA...

But part of the hysteria is also from poor coverage by the press, but especially from short quotes on social media. These quotes are usually taken out of context, or they emphasize distrust if recommendations change, or where recommendations are based on different circumstances (e.g. masks where nuanced discussions about different types of masks, who should or should not use them, or where they should be used is often lacking).

And then there are headlines that emphasize one fact, whereas if you read the entire article, you find that the headline is false.

Clickbate anyone?

For example the death from the British vaccine trial was given a lot of publicity, but how many knew that the guy who died received the placebo, not the vaccine?

Alas, similar anti vax stuff is all over the internet, in both right and left wing fringe blogs and social media.

This is not reality, but social contagion similar to the phenomenum described in the book 

Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (which was) an early study of crowd psychology by Scottish journalist Charles Mackay, (1841) which describes the psychological basis of everything from the witch trials to the crusades to the tulip craze to why people believe in ghosts to economic fads that resulted in major economic problems when that bubble burst.

That was 1841, but now with Twitter and Facebook etc. it is easier for rumors to spread, so the paranoid delusions often spread quickly and are hard to debunk.

In the Philippines, according to the AFP article, the anti vax disinformation is spread mainly via Facebook.

I believe this, because everyone here, even the lower middle class and even our farmers, have access to a smart phone or an internet cafe, and the younger generation live on Facebook and other social media sites.

This anti vax opposition thrives on fear, and there is a lot of fear of the virus here in the Philippines.

add to that a distrust of the government, an anti Duterte social media among the elite and students, and just ordinary folks who believe what they read. 

What is usually lacking is common sense, knowledge of the nuances of how vaccines work (including their side effects and limitations) and especially, the cost benefit ratio: that a dozen people suffering from side effects is better than tens of thousands sick or dead from the actual vaccines.

Sigh.

the nuanced discussion of this is on medical sites, of course, (medical discussions recognize the cost benefit ratio and the shortcomings of any vaccine but also recognizes the huge benefits from such vaccines. These sites also include information on who should should get the vaccine, who should not, and what is a side effect and what is not related to the vaccine).

here's an example of what we docs learn: notice it's 2 hours long and full of complicated data. 

So how many people will watch the long lecture, let alone understand it. 

In contrast, a short tweet or facebook post with paranoid anger behind it will be read by many and alas believed.

To make things worse: much of this anti vax fad is associated with the idea that natural living is better, and all medicines are bad. Use an herb, not a medicine that might cure you. Natural methods are better (really? How could anyone believe that here, when people die of diseases easily treated by western medicine?) 

So (to paraphrase Monty Python): What good has vaccinations done for us anyway?

but how can calm reasoning compete with the paranoid fringe theories out there: Again from the AFP article:

"I trust vaccines 100 percent,” said Jett Bucho, from a poor neighborhood of San Jose del Monte, after her one-year-old daughter was immunized against polio. But the 26-year-old said online conspiracy theories that a coronavirus vaccine could be used to implant chips and control humans had planted a seed of doubt in her mind. “On Facebook, if you keep scrolling, you see this,” she said. “It’s scary.”