With thanks to Global Health Now
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The detection of poliovirus in sewage treatment plants in Blantyre, Malawi, triggered a massive vaccination drive in the past week. But health authorities are fighting more than the virus.
• 1.3 million children have been vaccinated against the disease in four days with supplies airlifted by the WHO, The Guardian reports. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2026/feb/23/influencers-m...
Successful but: The rapid response has also run into indifference, misinformation, and reluctant parents.
• At a Blantyre school, one in 10 students remained at their desks during a vaccination drive because their parents didn’t give consent.
• One parent told The Guardian: “I feel my child has had enough vaccines in her life.”
Creative persuasion: Logic and evidence often fail in communities already persuaded by misinformation on social media, said a Unicef polio manager sitting with a group of mothers. So she said health workers turn to influencers:
• “You can give [a mother] any argument. It doesn’t matter. And then you have a local influencer walk in, and he says ‘vaccinate’, and she just hands you the child.”
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Best wishes, Neil
HIFA profile: Neil Pakenham-Walsh is coordinator of HIFA (Healthcare Information For All), a global health community that brings all stakeholders together around the shared goal of universal access to reliable healthcare information. HIFA has 20,000 members in 180 countries, interacting in four languages and representing all parts of the global evidence ecosystem. HIFA is administered by Global Healthcare Information Network, a UK-based nonprofit in official relations with the World Health Organization. Email: neil@hifa.org