Posting on „Nie szczepimy („We don’t vaccinate”) Internet forum

In Poland, there is a visible strengthening of hesitant attitudes towards vaccination, as well as institutionalization and politicization of hesitancy. The Internet is an important source of information about vaccinations. People who are looking for such information can find negative opinions on the web, so it is important to keep track of the content there. There is no national research on Internet anti-vaccination content.

To examine posting on the online forum “Nie szczepimy” (We don’t vaccinate).

The number of new users and new posts in the years 2008-2018 was examined, as well as the type of content and design of the selected 407 posts from 2009-2015. Categories according to Wolfe RM et al. (2002) were used for coding content and design of posts.

The number of users and posts was increasing for the first four years and then started to decrease. The most frequently discussed topic was the relation between vaccination and idiopathic illnesses (26.1%). The most common design was providing links to anti-vaccine sites (29.9%)

The content of the posts is very diverse and shows numerous users’ doubts. A significant part of the posts had a strongly emotional form. It would be important to regularly monitor various services and forms of communication on the Internet in terms of the content of anti-vaccinaton information.