r/GlobalTalk • u/hikekorea • Aug 03 '21
[Question] Are there anti covid vaxxers in your country like there are in the US? Question
I saw a post on another sub with a pastor screaming at his congregation not to get vaccinated. The US is combatting a wave of anti vaxxers stemming both from political and religious leaders and I’m curious how it is in other countries. I know most countries are still struggling to find enough doses and it embarrasses me that my country has people vehemently denying them.
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u/stormdressed New Zealand Aug 04 '21
Yeah of course.
The difference is that the idea hasn't been adopted by actual politicians and media to amplify it and give it legitimacy. It's just a bunch of morons shouting at traffic on the street corner
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u/haleandheartless Aug 04 '21 edited Aug 04 '21
Honestly these politicians profiting off covid hoaxes need to lined up against the wall.
It's pretty much calculated murder. They don't care about who they cause to die
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u/SharkAttackOmNom Aug 04 '21
They’re hedging that they’ll gain more supporter for “protectin muh freedoms” than they will kill.
I’m just hoping enough people affected will be a bit reflective and realize they have been duped.
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u/Chel_of_the_sea SF Bay Area, United States Aug 04 '21
I’m just hoping enough people affected will be a bit reflective and realize they have been duped.
Yeah, because the lesson of the last few years is definitely that people do that. /s
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u/DamnYouRichardParker Aug 04 '21
Yeah, in Canada here it's pretty much the same. There are nutters screaming about masks and vaccines but they are a very small minority.
And the political leaders haven't politicized/weaponized the issue.
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u/PM_ME_MY_FRIEND Aug 04 '21
There are some here in Finland. I talked to them when they had a rally, but there was like ten of them in the capital. The people in that rally were also government is lizard people kind of people so yeah.
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u/bargainkangaroo Aug 04 '21
Yeah came to say the same. They just import alt right identity politics here.
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u/bel_esprit_ Aug 04 '21
Is it coming from the US though? Bc in the US, we think these “fake news” and bad faith ideas come from Russia (or other bad actors) trying to sow confusion and social turmoil.
For example, the Russian company paying social media influencers large amount of money in several countries to promote anti-vax mistrust against Pfizer/Biontech, Moderna, etc.
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u/Tengri_99 Kazakhstan Aug 04 '21
I think we have one of the biggest anti-vaxx movements lol.
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u/Maybe-Jessica Aug 04 '21
So how big would that be, what's the percentage of people saying they're not going to get vaccinated against covid-19?
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u/whichrhiannonami Aug 04 '21
In Australia there are definitely anti vaxxers and people who straight up think covid is a hoax. This is mainly due to the Aus gov only securing Astrazeneca and then scaring everyone off with the blood clot concerns. We also got lucky last year with keeping our borders shut and having low numbers of covid cases, so some started questioning 'if its real, why dont i know anyone who had it?'
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u/colorfulzeeb Aug 04 '21
Weren’t there already a lot of anti-vaxxers prior to COVID though?
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u/whichrhiannonami Aug 04 '21
Yes. Especially people that live in coastal towns and promote an 'all natural' lifestyle. But covid has made more people jump on the anti vax bandwagon
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u/sirprizes Aug 04 '21
People that live in coastal towns eh? Isn’t that basically all Australians? I don’t know the specific numbers but I bet something 90-95% of all Australians live in towns or cities near the coast.
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u/Headlocked Aug 04 '21
Yep, 90% of the population of Australia lives within 50km of the coast. But I assume the OP means smaller coastal towns (e.g with less than ~5,000 people in them) since that kind of idiocy is usually reserved for dumbasses living outside of the main cities lol
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u/hayleyam Aug 04 '21
Yep that’s it! Places like Byron Bay and the small beach communities similar love to get in your face about 5G, Antivaxxing and how Covid doesn’t exist. The thing is, the people in these communities are privileged, white people on huge sparsely populated properties who don’t need to worry about social distancing etc.
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u/mrchaotica Aug 03 '21
Being an "anti-covid vaxxer" is exactly the opposite of being a "covid anti-vaxxer," and is therefore a good thing.
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u/TheBlairBitch Aug 04 '21
There's a small community in NZ that is highly influenced by what's going on in the US.
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u/thinkadrian Sweden 🇸🇪 Aug 04 '21
Both anti-vaxxers and covid anti-vaxxers here in Sweden. They get their “information” from US right-wing media outlets.
But absolutely none of the political parties or official news channels state these untruths. It’s just numb nuts perpetually on Facebook.
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u/wordsworths_bitch Aug 04 '21
official news channels
I'm curious why Sweden has a state news outlet.
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u/squirrelcat88 Aug 04 '21
Lots of normal democratic countries have news outlets financed by the government! It’s called public sector media - the British Broadcasting Corporation, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation - it almost seems weird to me to have a country, like the US, that doesn’t. They have editorial independence, it’s just that it costs money to run these things. It makes them less dependent on pleasing advertisers, and theoretically more able to just call things like they see them. It’s not the same thing as state controlled media, which is probably what you’re thinking of.
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u/wordsworths_bitch Aug 05 '21
financed by the government!
That's not the same as official. My local DMV hires joe schmo to trim the shrubs every so often. Just Because Joe is government funded doesn't mean that he's the county's official public gardening authority.
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u/squirrelcat88 Aug 05 '21
Haha no, of course! But I took it as that’s what the poster meant. The public broadcasters rather than the private ones
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u/Wild_Marker Argentina Aug 04 '21 edited Aug 04 '21
I think we got a few, but it's only a handful of fringe crazies (and yes, a lot of them imported the ideas from the US, so thanks for that).
As for politicians, some from the opposition made a ruckus when we started using Sputniks because they don't like Russia, (or maybe just because they wanted to make a ruckus, since once we got the Astras they started crying about not getting Pfizers) but thankfully they didn't really sway many people. Vaccines are vaccines and Sputniks were just as good as the rest, and thank fuck for that 'cause the Astras were delayed and Sputniks were all we had at first.
Caveat: I live in Buenos Aires. I heard the interior had some more significant issues with getting people to take the shot, but I don't know much about it.
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u/angrydeanerino Aug 04 '21 edited Aug 04 '21
Not trying to sound like an anti-vax nut here, but there _is/was_ geopolitical BS in the middle.
Easy one was Pfizer approval by decree a day after rejecting it in the Senate, just so the opposition didn't "win".
Either way, now we have pretty much all vaccines available, but it still rubs people (myself included) the wrong way that were was political BS in the middle of getting people vaccinated.
I got Sinopharm myself.
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u/Wild_Marker Argentina Aug 04 '21
Oh yeah, there was politcal bullshit on both sides, not gonna argue there. It was inevitable I suppose, but I guess that's election year for you. Heck, I'm pissed we HAVE Pfizers, since they had to drop their pants further for them than for anyone else in the contract, just because the opposition made it an issue that had to be fixed.
It's too bad the parties couldn't keep the "unity" they scrounged up at the start of the pandemic for longer, it was kinda nice for a change.
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u/peakpower Aug 04 '21
There are a bunch in Germany and anti pandemic measure protests have increased in volatility and violence especially in Berlin. The far eight political party AFD fuels that demographic.
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u/TedhaHaiParMeraHai India Aug 04 '21 edited Aug 04 '21
There are definitely a few anti-vaxxers here. If I would have to take a guess, I'm gonna guess that at least 10% of the people here are anti-vaxxers.
Thankfully enough, I haven't seen any major news channel or newspaper promote anti-vaxx theories here so far. But there are a few Youtube vloggers who have hundreds of thousands of subscribers and were spouting anti-vaxx BS.
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u/bel_esprit_ Aug 04 '21
We have them in Switzerland too. Or people who want to “wait and see” - it drives me crazy.
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u/squirrelcat88 Aug 03 '21
Here in Canada we have a few, but NOTHING like what you’re dealing with. Yikes! You guys have just reached 70% of eligible people vaccinated with a first dose, and we’re at over 80%. It’s not a political thing here in Canada.
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u/Violent_Violette Canada Aug 04 '21
It’s not a political thing here in Canada.
Well... People's Party of Canada leader Maxime Bernier says he won't get a COVID-19 vaccine
Not relevantly political at least.
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u/rayearthen Aug 04 '21
There've been anti vaxxer protests all throughout the pandemic in Toronto. There was even at one point an r/infowarriorRides style van driving around the province with lunatic anti vaccine slogans and bible quotes all over it
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u/squirrelcat88 Aug 04 '21
I’m near Vancouver and I saw one vehicle something like that too. I think most of the people I know of out here who haven’t gotten a shot yet are more “oh, we don’t know what’s in it, and we believe in natural remedies, we expect to be ok” - rather than religious nuts. These would be relatives of friends, that sort of thing. I haven’t heard of anybody even remotely connected to my social circle who’s actively and stubbornly against them, just hesitant and not fully understanding the seriousness of the disease.
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u/hikekorea Aug 04 '21
That’s awesome for you guys. Sad for us since we started waaaay sooner. I remember getting my vaccine during like phase 2.1 and my Canadian friends were still expecting to wait months. They have them now and my state is literally offering free vaccines at the airport… but we’re doing pretty poorly.
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u/WhiteRaven42 Aug 04 '21
.... 70 vs 80 isn't that big a difference.
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u/squirrelcat88 Aug 04 '21
It is when you consider the US manufactures vaccines and had a fair supply right away, and we don’t. We have only recently, maybe the last two or three weeks, started to switch from a situation where we’re all virtually standing in line for the vaccine. Where I am, you signed up on-line to indicate yes, I want a vaccine. Then you wait - maybe a few weeks - and you get a text from public health saying ok, your age group is up next, follow this link to make an actual appointment at the mass vaccination clinic. My 29 year old nephew is considered fully vaxxed as of today, so that gives you an idea of how the line has been moving. Small and remote communities have done things a bit differently, but with a few exceptions, we haven’t had vaccines casually available everywhere in drugstores the way Americans have.
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u/WhiteRaven42 Aug 05 '21
But Canada has a lower and somewhat less diverse population. It's simply easier to accomplish basically everything with a small population.
I'm 47, in America and sought the vaccine as soon as I was eligible... it took a couple months to track down a dose (set of doses, really). I only was fully vaccinated June 12th. And I live in a prosperous area with a middling to large population. I feel like you have an exaggerated view of how fast it was made available in the US.
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u/squirrelcat88 Aug 05 '21
Most importantly we’re both vaxxed!!! I hope we can stay healthy and safe, and the vaccine rolls out quickly to the rest of the world.
It’s a stereotype that we’re all a bunch of white lumberjacks - we’re actually more diverse than the US. We take in about a third of the immigrants that you do every year, but as you point out, we have a smaller population. We also resettle more refugees than the US relative to the size of our population. Reaching out to people who are relatively new here in a culturally appropriate way has been one of the challenges of our vaccination program.
Our smaller population is also spread out over a larger area. There are lots of villages up north only reachable by air or boat.
I live in the same sort of area you do and got my first dose ( AstraZeneca) on April 21 and my second dose ( Moderna ) on June 20. I’m 58.
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u/Jeheh Aug 04 '21
It is when you consider 70% of 350,000,000 vs 80% of 38,000,000.
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u/WhiteRaven42 Aug 05 '21
.... ok but I'd say reaching higher percentage on a lower population is easier, right? Is that what you're saying?
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u/shivj80 Aug 04 '21
Canada has less people than California though, so that percentage difference isn’t very impressive.
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u/squirrelcat88 Aug 04 '21 edited Aug 04 '21
Oh, the US has vaccinated far more people than we have, of course! My point is it’s been much less convenient to get a vaccine here than it is in the US and yet we’re still ahead. Oh, and if you want a fun vaccination number, look at Pitcairn Island. They have 100% of the population with a first shot and 76.6% fully vaccinated. That makes a grand total of 83 shots given out altogether and makes me wonder what happened to the ones who didn’t get a second shot. Maybe they were out on a fish boat or something? Kind of fun when your country’s vaccination number changes because of a few people.
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u/iiEviNii Aug 04 '21
Not really much of a thing in Ireland. A few very loud idiots shouting about it, but we have incredibly low vaccine hesitancy compared to a lot of other similar countries.
Over here, 85.8% of people who are eligible for vaccination (16+) have gotten at least one jab and that number is still increasing at a rate of ~0.5% per day. We'll probably tail off at around 92%, but that might be the highest you'll find in the world.
It's interesting - for a country that is historically (but not any more) incredibly religious, Ireland also has a really high rate of trust in science.
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u/CheeseboardPatster Aug 04 '21
France here. Yeah we have plenty. Infection rates are steadily increasing because of Delta variant, combined with the summer vacation where a large chunk of the population travels a bit, especially to the warm south of the country or the seashore. We are at around 50% of the population vaccinated, but still 20% of the 75+ year-olds are not vaccinated even though they are at the highest risk. What drives me crazy is my fellow French had the importance of vaccines drilled into their heads from a very young age at school : Louis Pasteur (anti rabies vaccination) is a kind of a national icon. And yet...
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u/plain_wallflower Aug 04 '21
We have a few of them around here in Brasil. But at the same time, being a poor country that has/had a lot of diseases, people here know and remember how was before vaccines. Also during a long time here (até least my generation, I'm 34) our vaccinations campaigns were awesome, with party and a mascot (funny thing is the American people think ou mascot, Zé Gotinnha looks like a KKK member). I have good memories from early 90s during vaccinations. Last o saw 94% of brasilian people want to have the vaccine.
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u/Phoenixdubz Aug 04 '21
From barbados. We have many people out here thinking the vaccine is a conspiracy and dangerous for them.
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u/TohaHeavyIndustries_ Germany Aug 04 '21
Yeah. The "Querdenker" movement here in germany, which while not 100% fascist have strong support by fascists and no problem marching together with them, has been a public health hazard since the beginning of the pandemic and they're a big reason for vaccination rates stagnating at around 62% and fucking hate their guts so goddamn much!
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u/Fiftyletters Netherlands Aug 04 '21
Yes, they protest and put stickers with "vaccine = poison" on stuff. We call them "wappies" [wah-pees], meaning something along the line of "loonies".
They are the exact stereotype as you would expect, with a lot of "do your own research" and reposting youtube videos of people who induce more fear.
We have some right-wing political parties who kinda flirt with those ideas, but not go as far as to actually claim vaccines are bad. They mostly claim covid is man_made or something.
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u/iiEviNii Aug 04 '21
We have some right-wing political parties who kinda flirt with those ideas, but not go as far as to actually claim vaccines are bad. They mostly claim covid is man_made or something.
Fuck Geert Wilders and Thierry Baudet
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u/simonbleu Argentina Aug 04 '21
There are stupid people absolutely everywhere. In fact, I would say most people is either stupid or completely gullible. In both cases they get carried along one with the other so... yeah, of course there is, is only natural (and sad)
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u/wordsworths_bitch Aug 04 '21
I would say most people is either stupid or completely gullible
You may want to check your Dunning Kruger.
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u/simonbleu Argentina Aug 04 '21
Oh I know about it, I never considered myself to be particularly smart either and always surrounded myself with smarter people (well, almost) but my point remains, regardless of me being in that that demographic or not
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u/smits017 Aug 04 '21
There's a fair few in the UK, I hear them whining and moaning about the jab when I'm at work all the time.
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u/agni39 India Aug 04 '21
We barely have them. We would love to keep it that way. But with the internet being more and more accessible with every passing day, I doubt it will stay this way.
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u/TheSecretIsMarmite Aug 04 '21
The comments section on some Cypriot media looks like it's filled with tinfoil hatters. 6 months ago the conspiracy theorists were downvoted to oblivion, but now those that try to speak up with anything rational get downvoted.
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u/boneyfingers Ecuador Aug 04 '21
Here in Ecuador, I only know one personally, and he is an ex-pat American. There may be more who are quiet about it, I'm not sure. But maybe they will be more apparent when there is more availability: it's hard to reject something before it is even an option.
There is, however, a growing sense of vaccine preference. Some are waiting until they can choose the one they want.
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u/eccedoge Aug 04 '21
The office of national statistics reports the UK has 96% positive sentiment towards the vaccine and 4% hesitancy
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u/Piorn Aug 05 '21
So Germany has this vegan cook dude who went into the deep end of conspiracies. Some posts are fairly standard, like vaccines, fake news, and new world orders.
Other posts are about how Space doesn't really exist, with NASA being a scam that shoot model rockets and film astronauts underwater.
He denies the Holocaust happened, and at the same time advocates for a real holocaust.
He's currently hiding in his homeland Turkey, ironically, because the "totalitarian German media" doesn't appreciate him stirring up bullshit publicly.
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u/Sithoid Aug 04 '21
It's batshit crazy in Russia. 54% of people weren't willing to vaccinate as of the beginning of July, and I can't find the link RN but I've definitely seen the notion that this figure is even higher among the medics. This, combined with the gradual advances towards mandatory vaccination, has led to the emergence of a black market where people fucking buy forged certificates for up to fucking $400!