Government Turns To Social Media To Defend Vaccine

WASHINGTON, DC (WUSA) -- As recently approved H1N1 flu vaccine begins to roll out of production facilities and make its way to clinics and doctor's offices around the United States, the federal government is preparing to defend it against attack on internet and social media sites.

"The problem is that when someone gets a vaccine, if some event occurs, a heart attack, a stroke, they will associate that event with the vaccine," said Dr. Henry Masur, a past president of the Infectious Disease Society. "But, we know that when hundreds of millions of people get a vaccine, events will occur, but whether it's a heart attack or stroke, whether it's a broken hip, whether it's something else, there may not be an association with a vaccine. So, we have to be very careful to make sure that if there is an issue, it really is linked to the vaccine, and the CDC, the FDA, NIH and the pharmaceutical companies are all going to be very interested in following people very closely to see if there is a causal link. We have every reason to believe that these vaccines will be as extraordinarily safe and effective as past vaccines have been."

"We know that information can travel rapidly and that the internet helps that information travel," said Dr. Bruce Gellin, the Director of the National Vaccine Program Office at the Department of Health and Human Services.

So, the government is already preparing to use the net and its social media sites to combat any false information that might arise when millions of Americans start receiving the vaccine. The Centers for Disease Control, for example, has already posted explanatory videos on YouTube and Facebook, and has established a Twitter account, as well.

"I think it's a good idea," said American University Assistant Professor David Johnson. "As I like to tell people when we talk about social media strategies for growing their business or to media companies who want to communicate on social media: We want to fish where fish are."

"It's not so much about having someone inside my walled garden or expecting them to come to my site.. if you're looking at a network like Facebook that just turned 310 million users...when you look at the rapid growth of Twitter over the last year...you definitely want to get into the platform. That doesn't guarantee that you're going to reach the audience, but you're at least talking on the place where the people are," Johnson told 9News Now.