Populist politics and vaccine hesitancy in Western Europe: an analysis of national-level data

European Journal of Public Health
Jonathan Kennedy

Abstract

Parents' reluctance to vaccinate their children undermines the effectiveness of vaccination programmes in Western Europe. There is anecdotal evidence suggesting a connection between the rise of political populism and vaccine hesitancy. This paper analyses national-level data to examine the link between political populism and vaccine hesitancy in Western Europe. Political populism is operationalised as the percentage of people in a country who voted for populist parties in the 2014 European Parliament elections. Vaccine hesitancy is operationalised as the percentage of people in a country who believe that vaccines are not important, safe and effective according to data from the Vaccine Confidence Project (2015). There is a highly significant positive association between the percentage of people in a country who voted for populist parties and who believe that vaccines are not important (R = 0.7923, P = 0.007) and effective (R = 0.7222, P = 0.0035). The percentage of people who think vaccines are unsafe just misses being significant at the 5% level (R = 0.5027, P = 0.0669). Vaccine hesitancy and political populism are driven by similar dynamics: a profound distrust in elites and experts. It is necessary for public health scholars ...Continue Reading

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Citations

Mar 3, 2019·BMJ : British Medical Journal·Owen Dyer
Jan 9, 2020·Perspectives in Public Health·J Kennedy
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