LJUBLJANA, SLOVENIA – An effective strategy in helping vaccine skeptics to come around to accepting immunizations for their children is to pivot the conversation away from vaccine safety and focus instead on the disease itself and its potential consequences, Saad B. Omer, MBBS, PhD, asserted at the annual meeting of the European Society for Paediatric Infectious Diseases.
Bruce Jancin/MDedge News
Dr. Saad B. Omer
“Why do we cede ground by focusing too much on the vaccine itself? I call it the disease salience approach,” said Dr. Omer, professor of global health, epidemiology, and pediatrics at Emory University in Atlanta.
It’s a strategy guided by developments in social psychology, persuasion theory, and communication theory. But if applied incorrectly, the disease salience approach can backfire, causing behavioral paralysis and an inability to act, he cautioned.
Dr. Omer explained that it’s a matter of framing.
“Always include a solution to promote self-efficacy and response-efficacy. After you inform parents of disease risks, provide them with actions they can take. Now readdress the vaccine, pointing out that this is the single best way to protect yourself and your baby,” he said. “The lesson is that since vaccines are a social norm, reframe nonvaccination as an active act, rather than vaccination as an active act.”
Don’t attempt to wow parents with statistics on how vaccine complication rates are dwarfed by the disease risk if left unvaccinated, he advised. Studies have shown that‘s generally not effective. What actually works is to provide narratives of disease severity.
“We are excellent linguists, but really, really poor statisticians,” Dr. Omer observed.
Is it ethical to talk to parents about disease risks to influence their behavior? Absolutely, in his view.
“We’re not selling toothpaste. We are in the business of life-saving vaccines. And I would submit that if it’s done correctly it’s entirely ethical to talk about the disease, and sometimes even the severe risks of the disease, instead of the vaccine,” said Dr. Omer.
If parents cite a myth about vaccines, it’s necessary to address it head on without lingering on it. But debunking a myth is tricky because people tend to remember negative information they received earlier.
“If you’re going to debunk a myth, clearly label it as a myth in the headline as you introduce it. State why it’s not true. Replace the myth with the best alternative explanation. Think of it like a blank space where the myth used to reside. That space needs to be filled with an alternative explanation or the myth will come back,” Dr. Omer said.
He is a coauthor of a book titled, ‘The Clinician’s Vaccine Safety Resource Guide: Optimizing Prevention of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases Across the Lifespan.’