The origins of Haiti’s vaccine hesitancy
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Facebook unearthed a vast Russia-based anti-vaccine disinformation campaign this week. On Tuesday, the social media giant announced that it had removed 65 Facebook and 243 Instagram accounts amplifying anti-vaccine content. Investigators from the company linked the network to British marketing firm Fazze and operated from Russia. The campaign — dubbed a “disinformation laundromat” by Facebook — primarily targeted users in Latin America, India, and the U.S. through fake articles and petitions circulated on Medium, Reddit and Change.org, and then spread on social media via fake Facebook and Instagram accounts. One of the conspiracies, often accompanied in this campaign by images from the “Planet of the Apes” movies, is the claim that the AstraZeneca jab would turn people into chimpanzees - an old favorite of Russian state propaganda.
In France, hostility towards vaccination is fueling vandalism, according to the French Ministry of Interior, which has recorded 22 acts of vandalism and 60 threats against testing and vaccination centers and pharmacies. Last month, someone flooded a vaccination center in southeast France and its walls graffitied with “vaccinations are the new genocide.” In Toulouse, a slip of paper found at a vaccination center contained the ominous warning that “one day this will all be blown up.” On Wednesday, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin sent a letter to local authorities calling on French police to more vigorously protect vaccine centers. The vandalism comes amid a surge of protests over the French government’s introduction of a health pass requiring proof of vaccination or a negative coronavirus test to enter cafes, restaurants, and other public places. Roughly 237,000 people protested across the country on Saturday, including 17,000 in Paris, according to the interior ministry.
No one is allowed to protest in Turkmenistan, one of the world’s most authoritarian states, where the government is now taking new measures against those who refuse to vaccinate. Authorities have repeatedly denied the existence of Covid-19, but that hasn’t stopped them from making vaccinations against it mandatory. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Turkmen service reports that in Turkmenistan’s northern Lebap region, doctors are turning over lists of vaccine refusers to the local officials.. Those who refuse the shot will be fined around $32 dollars and could lose their pensions.