Antivaxxers between fake news and personal concerns

What a journey! It began when the Lithuanian-Maltese journalist Daiva Repečkaitė posted in an online group: 'I'm looking for collaborators in Germany and Romania who are interested in the anti-vaccination movement.' A German-American journalist, Eva von Schaper, replied: And that's how this cross-border project began.

When the team initiated their project, 'Antivaxxers', the first cases of a respiratory illness caused by a novel virus began to emerge. As they watched the pandemic unfold in early 2020, they had to abandon their plans to report on 15 European countries. However, they began to notice patterns of behaviour in the anti-Covid movement that mirrored those of the anti-vaccine movement. They therefore decided to expand their project to include investigative data journalism in order to map this new movement.

In the course of their investigation, the journalists spoke to key experts, doctors, activists and parents who were hesitant about vaccines. They also examined transcripts of parliamentary meetings, government data, surveys and official statistics.

In addition to numerous articles they are publishing in various languages, they are sharing these stories on The Inoculation Podcast.

The Inoculation, a podcast where the team tells international stories on health, misinformation, vaccines, COVID-19, public policies, and more. Daiva and Eva are looking into the politics and values surrounding public health, starting from vaccination.

You can follow The Inoculation on Twitter at @TInoculation

Photo credit: Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona via Unspash