We’ll sift facts from fiction

Alot of people have concerns about the Covid-19 vaccine. The pandemic – let alone the vaccine that’s designed to get us out of it – still feels relatively new. It can sound like there are a lot of possible side-effects from the vaccines. And in Aotearoa, we remain virtually Covid-free, so the slightest doubt about the vaccine can have some people feeling it’s better to defer. These sorts of anxieties are natural. Many people have them.

But the stakes involved are high. They’re bordersopen-or-shut high. They’re more-lockdowns-or-not high. They’re life-and-death high.

We owe it to one another to interrogate our anxieties about the vaccine. Are the things standing in the way of getting it things you really need to worry about? Are any perceived risks from getting vaccinated proportionate to the risks of not? And what is the quality of the evidence you’re relying on?

On social media, information about the Covid-19 vaccination is largely unmediated. A lot of dangerous disinformation is weeded out by Facebook. But plenty of misleading material remains. This stuff can be especially pernicious because it picks at, and harvests, those underlying anxieties that reasonable people can have about the vaccines. Its influence on the community’s view is far greater than it ought to be, considering the lack of rigour behind it. An alarming proportion of people in surveys say they believe one or more conspiracy theories about Covid-19.

What is the antidote? A lot of research has been conducted into misinformation in the past few years. One consistent finding is the important role of trusted community figures in explaining the known facts about things like the Covid vaccine. The family doctor, for example, is a top pick.

There is a role for mainstream media, like Stuff, too. We’re conscious that, worldwide, trust in the media is falling. We’re working on that. We have to, because we’re equally conscious of the power of our platform. Across Stuff, our newspapers and magazines, we reach 2.3 million Kiwis each week. By any measure, in a New Zealand context, what we publish matters.

Our Covid-19 fact-checking project, launched today, is a response to misinformation about the vaccines. In The Whole Truth – Covid-19 Vaccination, wewill call out specific examples of egregious misinformation. But the kaupapa is greater than that. Many of our posts will proactively explain the known facts about the vaccines in areas most prone to misinformation. We’ll use animated video, fronted by experienced broadcasters, as the centrepiece of a visually rich body of work.

A diverse expert panel of public health practitioners, researchers and policy-makers is helping to make sure we get things right. We’ll show our working on every post, linking to published research.

Covid-19 presents a particular threat to Ma¯ori and Pacific people. Modelling suggests Ma¯ori are 50 per cent more likely to die from coronavirus than non-ma¯ori. In the United States, it was reported that Pacific Islanders were hospitalised at up to 10 times the rate of other groups.

People in these communities have reason to be sceptical of government institutions that have historically mistreated them. With decreased trust in official messaging, they’re more likely to turn elsewhere for their information. We have partnered with Ma¯ori Television and the Pacific Media Network to increase the exposure of our work in these communities. We also benefit from their experience in choosing what to cover and how to cover it. They are an important part of the project.

The Whole Truth – Covid-19 Vaccination will run for about six months. We expect to publish dozens of posts and videos to our site, the websites of our partners, across social media, on Youtube and Playstuff.

We received funding for the project from the Google News Initiative. We’re using that to pay the animators, presenters, translators and expert panellists who are working on it. The journalism is independent and created according to Stuff’s code of ethics.

The stakes involved are high. They’re borders-open-or-shut high. They’re life-and-death high.