IN-DEPTH: Government Ad Showing Children Pleading With Parents for Vaccines Is ‘Exploitative’ and Could Break the Law: Campaigners
Campaign criticised for not providing information on potential side-effects with claims it could be in breach of advertising regulations protecting children.
Molly, a 7-year-old labrador therapy dog, is stroked by Jake Gregory of Cornwall while Jake receives his COVID-19 vaccination at a temporary NHS COVID vaccination centre in Wadebridge, England, on Aug. 20, 2022. (Hugh Hastings/Getty Images)
A government advert has been criticised by health campaigners for what they say is an “exploitative” and “cynical” depiction of children pleading with their parents to get them vaccinated, as childhood immunisation rates continue to fall.
The advert will be shown on TV and online from Monday and features a number of young children looking directly at the camera and reading out a script, apparently directly addressing their parents or carers in solemn voices.
It opens with a shot of a little girl and a baby before switching to other children, who recite the lines: “Our generation’s risk of illness like measles and whooping cough is rising. If we’re not vaccinated, we’re not protected, and could get seriously ill, risking lifelong disabilities.”
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) launched its emotive campaign, made in conjunction with the NHS and aimed at increasing the uptake of all childhood vaccines following a measles outbreak centred around the West Midlands and London. Official figures show there have been around 650 recorded cases since last October, with none proving fatal.
A mother whose daughter had a life-threatening reaction to a vaccine she received as a baby said she found the advert “triggering” and “sick,” while the founder of a Facebook group that advocates for parental choice said she was concerned that young children might see the advert and feel scared.
Anna Watson, who founded the Arnica group, told The Epoch Times: “It makes me uncomfortable that children are seeing this … I wonder what time slot they are going to be playing this? Because if children are seeing this and then they’re asking their parents are they protected or are they going to die, I just think that is unforgivable.”
“It makes me feel really uncomfortable to over-dramatise things and add a lot of fear to society when we have already been made fearful.
“We had a lot of fear through COVID, and through recent wars, and I think a lot of us are feeling quite vulnerable.”
Ms. Watson, who has teenage children, pointed to statistics from the World Health Organisation which show the UK uptake of the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine, and before that the single measles jab, has never been 95 percent, which is what the experts say is needed for herd immunity.
She said the assumption that people are protected because they have been vaccinated is false, and there are many instances of vaccinated people getting measles.
In the 15 years since she founded Arnica, she has not heard of many people—vaccinated or not—getting measles.
She said it was a concern that there was no mention of possible side-effects in the advert, and pointed out that inserts on vaccines, including the MMR jab, state clearly that the product has not been tested for carcinogenics or any potential to impair fertility.
“For me, I’m far more wary of the risk of my child developing a cancer than I am from the things [the vaccines] are meant to protect you from,” she said.
Dr. Elizabeth Evans of the UK Medical Freedom Alliance said in a statement to The Epoch Times, “We are appalled at the new UKHSA video which uses children in a highly coercive way, showing them pleading with parents to get them vaccinated in an apparent attempt to emotionally blackmail parents to accept vaccines for their children.”
She added that the claims made in the advert are “highly sensational” and that the risks of illness to individual children “appear to be grossly exaggerated and unquantified to promote parents’ fear for their children’s safety.”
A nurse uses a syringe to prepare an injection of the combined measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccination at an MMR drop-in clinic at Neath Port Talbot Hospital near Swansea in south Wales on April 20, 2013. (Geoff Caddick/AFP via Getty Images)
‘Violating the Law on Informed Consent’
In addition, Dr. Evans pointed out that no medication, including a vaccine, is without the risk of side-effects, which can be serious.
“There is no mention of potential side-effects from the vaccines, violating the law on informed consent which requires full disclosure of risks as well as benefits from a medical intervention to allow an individualised risk versus benefit analysis.
“We deplore this cynical use of children to propagandise parents (and older children who may see this video) to accept a vaccine for their child that they may not personally benefit from and which they may experience harms from. This is not an ethical, sober, or responsible way to practise medicine.”
Alongside the TV campaign, the advert will be shown across a range of channels and formats, including radio advertising, digital display, online, and social media.
“Additional advertising will be seen in the West Midlands, North West and London where we know there are larger pockets of low uptake. The campaign will be supported by a number of key stakeholders, including local authorities and NHS organisations,” the UKHSA said.
After a morning appearance on the BBC to promote the latest campaign, the chief executive of the UKHSA, Professor Dame Jenny Harries, visited Liverpool and Manchester to continue the drive to boost vaccination rates.
Decline in Uptake of All Childhood Vaccination
Ms. Harries called for an “urgent reversal” of the decline in the uptake of childhood vaccinations to “protect our communities.”
“Through this campaign we are particularly appealing to parents to check their children’s vaccination status and book appointments if their children have missed any immunisations. The ongoing measles outbreak we are seeing is a reminder of the very present threat.
“While the majority of the country is protected, there are still high numbers of children in some areas that continue to be unprotected from preventable diseases. It is not just their own health that can suffer, but other unvaccinated people around them such as school friends, family, and those in their community could also experience serious infections.
“Unless uptake improves we will start to see the diseases that these vaccines protect against reemerging and causing more serious illness.”
Health minister Maria Caulfield echoed the sentiment of Ms. Harries, saying, “Parents want what is best for their children, and that includes the vital protection that vaccines provide from preventable diseases.”
But Dr. Evans said that the line from the advert “if we are not vaccinated, we are not protected” is factually inaccurate because “it ignores the innate protection provided by a healthy immune system that will enable the vast majority of children to sail through childhood infections without complications, especially when they are nursed well and supportively.”
She added that using children to advertise vaccinations is “exploitative and unethical” and said the government may be in breach of the Advertising Standards Agency’s (ASA’s) code of practice, which aims to protect children from exploitation.
The ASA guidelines state that “marketers must not exaggerate what is attainable by an ordinary child using the marketed product,” which Dr. Evans believes the advert falls foul of by implying that vaccination offers guaranteed protection against illness.
UK Health Security Agency Chief Executive Jenny Harries attends a press conference inside the Downing Street Briefing Room in central London on Oct. 20, 2021. (Toby Melville /Pool/AFP via Getty Images)
Government Could Be in Breach of Its Own Guidelines
Dr. Evans pointed to the government’s own advice on advertising medicines, which says, “You must not ... state that normal health can be improved by taking the medicine or be affected by not taking the medicine.”
She said that instead of “fear-mongering,” the government and public health authorities should be “empowering parents with the information that there are treatments to reduce the severity of measles and almost eliminate the risk of complications, particularly high doses of vitamin A, as advised by the World Health Organisation, for measles outbreaks and as treatment for the illness.”
A number of parents have raised concerns online about their children—some as young as 12—receiving letters from their GPs informing them that they may now have the right to receive medical treatments, such as vaccines, without their parents’ knowledge or consent. They may be judged to be “Gillick competent” under the law, meaning they have the capacity to understand and give consent to such procedures.
Katie Holden is a mother who no longer vaccinates her daughter, now 13, after she suffered a life-threatening reaction to the diptheria, polio, and tetanus jab as a baby. She branded the advert “disgusting.”
“I just wonder how many millions they’ve put behind this campaign … when I personally know of, and have been one of millions of parents in the UK struggling—really struggling—with this cost of living crisis and keeping food on the table. Yet the government thinks it’s fitting now to put money behind a campaign like this.
“It’s just emotional manipulation and bullying ... If something was so good for us, if something was so beneficial for our children, they wouldn’t need to advertise it.
“Why are people not asking why there is so much vaccine hesitancy?”
Ms. Holden said that she trusted the NHS as a young mother, but her experience when Ella almost died after a vaccine was one of “horrific gaslighting” and denialism by doctors, which led her to research vaccine damage for herself.
“I found out about how health policy was hijacked in the 1800s … up until then I thought doctors knew everything … about vaccine ingredients and the risks. They’re not given any adequate training [on vaccines].
“There’s an abundance of evidence that vaccines absolutely can and regularly do cause horrific harm,” she added.
Measles is a relatively mild and self-resolving infection for the vast majority of children and adults, but can occasionally be more serious, especially for those with underlying health conditions and pregnant women.
The illness is more serious in poorer, less developed countries which do not have proper sanitation. The death rate from measles in the UK declined to virtually zero well before the introduction of the single measles jab in 1968, with the MMR triple jab first introduced in 1988.
Between 2006 and 2016, there were four reported deaths from measles, and prior to 2006, the last known death was in 1992. Over the 20-year period from 2002–2222, a total of 23 people died of the illness.
The Epoch Times asked the UKHSA whether the NHS carried out longitudinal studies comparing the health outcomes of unvaccinated and “fully vaccinated” children, or those who have had all recommended jabs.
A spokesman for the UKHSA said the NHS is a separate body and that they did not hold that information.
The NHS has previously declined to answer the same question, but it is not believed the NHS carries out such studies.
Rachel Roberts is a London-based journalist with a background in local then national news. She focuses on health and education stories and has a particular interest in vaccines and issues impacting children.
