Stuff to launch Covid fact checking project
A Stuff project to fight misinformation about the Covid-19 vaccination has won support from a global fund.
‘‘The Whole Truth: Covid-19 Vaccination’’ will be launched in April and published in partnership with Ma¯ori TV and the Pacific Media Network.
The project was selected by the Google News Initiative for support from its Covid-19 Vaccine Counter Misinformation Open Fund.
The $4.2 million fund has been allocated across a number of similar journalism projects around the world. All are designed to fight falsehoods about the Covid19 immunisation. The fund was also designed to encourage projects that aim to reach audiences underserved by factchecking or targeted by misinformation.
Vaccine hesitancy
New Zealand’s long-term strategy for managing the impact of Covid19 is to achieve herd immunity via mass vaccination.
But a significant number of people are likely to refuse the vaccine. Many of them will do so because of misplaced fears about the vaccine, stoked by misinformation.
Across the country, the proportion of Ma¯ori children and babies vaccinated against a range of diseases is about 5 percentage points lower than for children and babies of European ethnicity. Among people aged over 65, there is a 9 percentage point gap in vaccination rates for the existing flu vaccine between non-Ma¯ ori and Ma¯ ori.
Common across all groups where vaccine uptake is at dangerously low levels is the impact of social media in fomenting distrust.
In a previous Stuff investigation into vaccine refusal, Jill Clendon, a senior nurse with more than 25 years of experience in immunisation, said the burgeoning network of misinformation on social media was the single biggest change she had seen in her time in the field.
‘‘It is difficult. People often don’t know which way to go and what is the truth and what’s not the truth,’’ she said.
A failure to achieve herd immunity would be especially dangerous for Ma¯ ori.
Research shows Ma¯ ori are 50 per cent more likely to die from coronavirus.