Ukrainian Immunisation and Polio Social Media Work

CI has been asked by USAID to develop the capacity to support pro-vaccination action on Ukrainian social media.  We are doing this because Ukraine has a history of public mistrust in vaccinations, poor vaccine supply, poor surveillance and corruption in the health system.  It is also a place in which the mainstream media is not trusted as it tends to be in the hands of one oligarch or another and is percieved to be biased.  Because of this many people, especially those in the generation most likely to have young children are turning to social media for their news and information.  However, there is a lot of misonformation and outright anti-vaccination propaganda on the most popular social media platforms.  It is important to counter this to improve Ukraine's coverage rates from the lowest in Europe (see http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-24504960 for more info).

We are planning to do this in two steps.  The first is to convene a roundtable in Washington DC with experts in polio and immunisation and respected members of Ukraine's large diaspora population in North America.  This will help identify and crystalise a Ukrainian perspective on the issues and also give us the core of a Ukrainian expert advisory group.  Beyond this it will offer a venue for US experts and political leaders to learn more about Ukraine's immunisation context as it is understood by Ukrianians themselves and to provide the US-Ukrainian Foundation (our partner in organising this event) with a statement and recommendations for what should be done to turn the situation around.  Based partly on the outcomes of this meeting and partly on analysis of the social media and immunisaiton context in Ukraine we will begin the second step which is to hire a social media expert in Ukraine who is fluent in English, Ukrainian and Russian and has a strong understanding of immunisaiton issues to generate a social media presence for accurate information on polio and immunisation and act as a counter to anti-vaccination messages and misinformation.

We have been working with a Canadian consultant (Michael Bociurkiw) and member of the Ukrainian diaspora who has experience with very high profile communication issues in Ukraine such as the shooting down of MH17 and who also has extensive experience working with social media.  This will keep us quite busy through March and into the months that follow.  

We'll keep you informed as things progress as we feel there is a lot for CI to learn from this type of initiative.