Opinion

Claire Simpson: Vocal anti-vaccination lobby won't help coronavirus battle

People take part in an anti-vaccination protest in Parliament Square, London, in December. File picture by Luciana Guerra, Press Association
People take part in an anti-vaccination protest in Parliament Square, London, in December. File picture by Luciana Guerra, Press Association People take part in an anti-vaccination protest in Parliament Square, London, in December. File picture by Luciana Guerra, Press Association

“What news from town?” mum and I said to my younger sister last week after she came back from the local garage.

The number of people in the garage shop, how busy the village was and, most importantly, the price of Shloer in the Spar compared to Tesco were picked over like the pre-Christmas Brexit agreement. No piece of new information was too trivial. A bottle of sparkling red grape was £2.20? One person wasn’t sticking to social distancing in the queue for the butcher? The inflatable Santa in that house down the road had deflated? Tell me more.

Over Christmas, we felt like we were living in a Regency period drama (minus the money, glamour and dancing) with nothing to do but sit in the front room or go for long walks and hope that something, anything, would happen. Then we watched the news, heard about the ever-increasing infection rates, and decided boredom, even watching mind-numbingly dull Netflix costume drama Bridgerton, was much better than the alternative.

It might be decades before we will be able to fully appreciate what an odd year 2020 was. And 2021 is shaping up to be more of the same until vaccinations are fully rolled out. Most of us are eagerly awaiting our jab. Quite frankly I’ll take anything which will allow our lives to return to some semblance of normality. Never having felt the need to become a scientist myself, I’m quite happy to leave the intricacies of the vaccines and how they actually work to the people who have spent decades studying how to fight disease - just as I leave changing the exhaust on my car, re-tiling my roof and all medical procedures to those who know what they’re doing.

So it’s hard to empathise with the small, but incredibly vocal anti-vaccination lobbyists who insist that they know best.

Online misinformation about the vaccines and the wearing of masks is posted, overwhelmingly, by people with zero medical or scientific expertise.

Respected Co Tyrone GP Dr Kieran Deeny said last week that social media companies should remove "dangerous and potentially lethal nonsensical statements" about the vaccines, including incorrect claims that they alter a person’s DNA.

"I've personally studied and researched the Covid-19 vaccines and whilst, as with all vaccines, a mild reaction can occur, without any shadow of doubt the major risks from Covid-19 infection far outweigh the very minor risks associated with any of the Covid-19 vaccines," he said.

Opposition to vaccines isn’t new. In the late 19th century, tens of thousands of people in England protested against compulsory smallpox vaccinations. Some were arrested, fined and even jailed.

Coronavirus vaccinations will not be made compulsory. In fact, there are long-standing laws which allow people to opt out of receiving vaccinations.

Why then, is opposition growing?

Long before the pandemic, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said “vaccine hesitancy” was one of the top 10 threats to global health.

It pointed out in 2019 that measles cases had risen by 30 per cent globally. Although not all of these cases were due to people refusing vaccinations, some countries which were close to eliminating measles had seen a resurgence. In 2016, the WHO declared the UK ‘measles-free’, meaning that no cases of the virus had originated in the country. By 2019, measles cases were on the rise in the UK, mainly in young people who had missed out on the MMR jab.

Misinformation about the MMR jab has been blamed for a drop in vaccinations. And misinformation about the coronavirus vaccines is spreading as fast as the virus.

Human beings are incredibly good at deceiving themselves. Frustration, anger and boredom, combined with unverified information and, quite frankly, the government’s poor handling of the pandemic, make for a dangerous mix.

At a time when the world seems a dark and confusing place, it’s very easy to cling to conspiracy theories about global hoaxes and bizarre claims about vaccines. Except, if the pandemic really is a hoax concocted by governments and major tech companies to control us then they haven’t done a particularly good job of it.

The world is hard enough at the moment without seeing monsters which don’t exist. Here’s to some common sense in 2021.