Extracts from a news item on WHO Africa Regional Office website, and a comment from me below. Read online: https://www.afro.who.int/news/rallying-combat-covid-19-rumours-democrati...
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Rallying to combat COVID-19 rumours in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
04 March 2022
Kinshasa – It can be hard to tease apart fact from falsehood amid the distorted, oft-repeated COVID-19 stories. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a network of myth busters is on constant watch, tracking and addressing misinformation thanks to government efforts with support from World Health Organization (WHO) and partner organizations.
“At the start of the pandemic, we were inundated with rumours and disinformation on COVID-19 and vaccines,” says Imam Famba Ali Huseini, leader of the Usoke Central Mosque in a busy neighbourhood. “In Kinshasa’s Muslim community, people feared the vaccine. Some thought Africans were being used as guinea pigs, and that the vaccines were made with pork gelatine.”
WHO has worked with the Ministry of Health to establish a rumour alert and refutation system. Health workers, community and religious leaders, and journalists have been trained to detect and manage disinformation. The goal is to equip the public with accurate COVID-19 information so that vaccines can protect more lives.
During an information campaign visit to his mosque, the imam recalls, “the doctor took us through the standard process involved in making the vaccine. He broke down the vaccine’s composition, which allowed us to see that it contains no pork gelatine.
“But even more importantly,” he continues, “he showed us the vaccination statistics in Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia and Indonesia, where people have been accepting the vaccine.”...
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COMMENT (NPW): We have noted previously on HIFA that COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy is linked with lack of reliable information about the benefits and harms of vaccination, and we have asked "What is being done to address this knowledge gap?". The above experience in DR Congo suggests that people can understand, and be motivated by, basic vaccination statistics. Is anyone aware of efforts to illustrate benefits of vaccination as compared with harms?
Neil Pakenham-Walsh, HIFA Coordinator, neil@hifa.org www.hifa.org
