Earlier this week we suggested the best way to counter vaccine fears and conspiracies was with creative-minded solutions, not authoritarian-sounding declarations about compulsory vaccination programmes.
There were three main alternative strategies we offered.
One: Bigging up messaging that highlighted the public duty of getting vaccinated, something we believe would work wonders with all those inclined to signal their virtuous acts loudly across social media.
Two: Getting high-profile celebrities, officials and leaders to take the vaccine first so as to drum up public confidence in its safety. This would be akin to a “skin in the game” strategy and would be especially effective with the conspiracy-inclined if it featured those who have become central figures in conspiracy narratives such as Bill Gates, The Queen, Joe Biden etc etc.
Three: Launching counter-conspiracies that would challenge the accepted conspiratorial view that it’s the vaccine that should not be trusted rather than the virus itself. Like the idea that the vaccine is actually here to save us from Alien colonisation.
It didn’t take long for the system to provide.
In a weird on-air rendition of the game of chicken, Piers Morgan started the ball rolling on Wednesday when he challenged Matt Hancock, the UK health secretary, to take the vaccine live on air with him if it helped to reassure the public about its safety. Hancock agreed, providing the act was approved since Morgan didn’t qualify as priority case, being a healthy middle-aged man.
Nicola Sturgeon has now supposedly followed suit, promising to also join in with the live spectacle and Boris Johnson might too, according to the Daily Mail.
On the same day, the Washington Post’s Alyssa Rosenberg argued that Biden and Harris should get vaccinated live on TV too, saying:
Biden and Harris can use their inoculations to take the public inside the vaccine development and delivery process and, in doing so, build confidence in an unprecedented scientific accomplishment. Such a concrete demonstration of the vaccines could also help Americans recommit to the public health measures that will be a bridge between our current disaster and the new normal we all hope will be here soon.
Soon after that former US president Barack Obama’s declared that he would be happy to take the vaccine publicly too. And he is now also being joined by former presidents George Bush and Bill Clinton.
So the big question now is: will this sort of thing actually reassure the public? A Gallup poll earlier in November had found 42 per cent of Americans had doubts about the vaccine.
The initial feedback from the doubters is “no it won’t”, because “how do we know they’re not getting a placebo”?
Our own preferred control for this vulnerability (at least in the dystopian world of 2020) is of course enlisting well-known conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones and David Icke to pick out the samples to be used from batches which would otherwise be destined for general public consumption. The delivery and administration of the sample should then be supervised by 12 honest individuals picked at random from among the public in a similar way juries are constructed.
What’s not to like?
Not much. Apart from . . . one small thing: the clear and present danger that any overly successful adoption by the rich and privileged leads the conspiracy minded to conclude that was actually the plan all along.
That is to say they begin to believe their fears were intentionally cultivated so as to ensure the vaccine could and would be harmoniously distributed to the rich and the privileged first.
Yep, there’s no end to the potential game theoretical strategising. We assume 2020 will be enough to keep behavioural economists busy for many decades.
Source: Economy - ft.com
