‘Vaccination campaign needed for vulnerable neighborhoods’

General practitioners, specialists and their interest groups want vaccination campaigns aimed at people in disadvantaged neighborhoods. They are concerned about the low turnout in those neighborhoods. The initiators of the letter to the Ministry of Health are Shakib Sana, general practitioner in Rotterdam, and Robin Peeters, internist at Erasmus MC.

According to the doctors, important information about the vaccines does not reach about 35 percent of the population. They do not understand or receive the information provided at the corona press conferences by outgoing Prime Minister Rutte and Minister De Jonge.

This is very noticeable in disadvantaged neighborhoods. There the chance of becoming infected is twice as high. The chance of dying from Covid-19 is also twice as likely as in other people. The low vaccination coverage can – in the long term – lead to a ‘virus reservoir’, from which reinfections will continue to arise, they warn.

‘Turnout only 30 percent’

General practitioner Sana notices that many of his patients do not show up for their vaccination appointment. The turnout is between 30 and 40 percent. He is very concerned about this, because it is precisely in the disadvantaged neighborhoods that the chance of becoming seriously ill is high. Conditions such as diabetes, diabetes, lung diseases and obesity are relatively common there.

Changes in vaccination policy, for example around the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, have led to great fear and doubt, according to Sana. “People also receive one-sided information from their environment, which causes them to doubt and become anxious. I try to change their minds, but that takes me 45 minutes per patient. I don’t have that time.”

Negative influence on social media

“Many of these people get their information from social media and are completely misinformed as a result,” Sana continues. “They think, for example, that the vaccine will make them sterile.”

He and fellow doctors therefore want a national public campaign to be launched, aimed at local media and population groups that are difficult to reach. They want reliable information to be disseminated in club and community centers, as well as in social shelters, migrant organizations, churches, mosques, asylum centers and, for example, frequently visited markets.

They also propose to have figureheads from the local community talk about their vaccination.

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