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Univerziteta u Beogradu
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Doubt in Medical Science As An Important Consequence Of The Covid-19 Pandemic: The Case Of Serbia
Šuvaković, Uroš
One of the greatest achievements of medical science and science in general is the vaccine invention – by Edward Jenner who created the smallpox vaccine. In honor of this invention, Pasteur suggested that all vaccines should be giv- en that name, and the vaccine discovered by Jenner was named after him. Moreover, thanks to the efforts of the World Health Organization (WHO), smallpox was declared eradicated in 1980, which was the first eradication case ever of a human disease. Owing to vaccines, millions of hu- man lives have been saved, particularly when it comes to infectious diseases such as smallpox. On the example of Serbia, we show the continued action of antivaxxers in the past ten years. Public figures, most- ly with no medical education, led a mass-media campaign against the MMR vaccine, which resulted in local epidem- ics, primarily measles, and was followed by the COVID-19 pandemic, when the announcement of the vaccine created against this disease immediately sparked stories about its harm to human health. In Serbia, the already existing pre- requisites through years-long action of the anti-vaccine lob- by were combined with the new cause – anti-COVID-19 vac- cination, where this lobby’s activities were transferred on to social media. The anti-vaccination process was strongly politicized and supported by foreign news pointing to vac- cine nationalism, affairs regarding vaccine acquisition, corporations fighting for profit and many other weaknesses, which further deepened the Serbian citizens’ mistrust. By the end of the pandemic, approximately 60% of adult cit- izens were vaccinated against COVID-19, which does not necessarily mean doubt was removed.
https://www.europeansociology.org/publications/esa-conference-abstract-books
engleski
2024
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