GPs want a 'clear and understandable' Covid-19 vaccination campaign for disadvantaged neighborhoods

In a letter to the Ministry of Health, two doctors ask for a "clear and understandable" information campaign about the corona vaccination. The authors, the Rotterdam general practitioner Shakib Sana and professor and internist at Erasmus MC Robin Peeters, notice that a lot of information is now passing by part of the population, especially in disadvantaged neighborhoods. Their call is supported by a long list of health care providers, professional associations of doctors and nurses, and several hospitals.

According to Sana and Peeters, the government's changing vaccination strategy has led to great fear and doubt among vulnerable people in disadvantaged neighborhoods. "People who already receive limited and often one-sided information from their environment appear to base their choices on that fear and doubt. "The willingness to get vaccinated is therefore very low in those neighborhoods, while the chance of becoming infected with corona and dying from it is relatively high."

Moreover, according to Sana and Peeters, the information from the press conferences of Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Health Minister Hugo de Jonge are rather formal and therefore do not reach 35 percent of the population. That is why clear and accessible information should be provided for "people who do not have sufficient command of the language and are not able to follow it so quickly". The medical duo advocates a large-scale campaign via national but also mainly local media. They also want the government to use community and clubhouses, churches and mosques, asylum seekers' centers and markets to disseminate information.

"The way out of the pandemic is to vaccinate a large part of the population," said Sana and Peeters.