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Vaccination Acceptance Research Network

VARN 2022 Conference

VARN2022: Shaping Global Vaccine Acceptance with Localized Knowledge

From March 1-3, 2022, we convened the Vaccination Acceptance Research Network’s inaugural conference to serve as a space for exploration, knowledge sharing and priority-setting at the intersection of immunization and social and behavioral research.

Conference Report

The report offers a synthesis of the discussions and findings from the three-day event. Our multidisciplinary contributors and attendees share evidence from interventions designed to further understand and break down barriers to vaccine acceptance and demand in over 40 countries.

Report Download
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Presentations

Watch research presentations from 32 research teams in anthropology, epidemiology, public health, and medicine across academia, government, civil society and more.

Playlist of all Recordings
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Posters

Explore 10 research posters accompanied by audio recordings from our presenters.

Playlist of all Posters

Join Us for VARN2023!

VARN2022 brought together 750+ global experts as registered attendees across 76 countries. Participants represented diverse sectors including academia, government, journalism, and technology. The success of VARN’s inaugural conference reflects the desire and need for convening around critical vaccination acceptance and demand research, strategies and policy.
Connect with our network for events, blogs, funding opportunities and announcements for VARN2023.

Emerging Themes

The insights that emerged from the conference will set the stage for ongoing collaboration and future activities through VARN with our members and local, regional, and global stakeholders. Dive into the 4 themes and 14 key lessons presented in the report and find supporting research and discussions in the virtual platform.

Theme 1: Understanding Vaccine Acceptance and its Drivers

Key Lessons:

  • Vaccine acceptance is complex and context-specific, varying across time, place and type of vaccine
  • Vaccine inequity and weakened health systems are barriers to vaccination access and demand

Theme 2: Community and Context-Specific Approaches to Increase Vaccine Acceptance

Key Lessons:

  • Community-centric methods are essential to increase vaccine acceptance
  • Healthcare providers are trusted messengers, but they also need training and resources
  • Non-traditional actors have power to address and improve vaccine acceptance in the community
  • Social and gender inequity can act as barriers to vaccine uptake
  • Communities of practice are an essential tool to drive community participation

Theme 3: Fighting the "Infodemic" & Harnessing Social Media for Good

Key Lessons:

  • Misinformation flourishes in the absence of quality information, particularly on social media, and agile research practices are needed to fill information voids
  • There is a need to build capacity and train infodemiologists to identify and combat misinformation
  • Social media and digital health platforms can be leveraged to combat the infodemic through approaches that have the right appeal, message and messenger
  • Training and science-based gaming can be effective tools

Theme 4: Frameworks, Data Integrity & Evaluation of Best Practices

Key Lessons:

  • There are key social and behavioral drivers of vaccine uptake that can be targeted in communications for change
  • Best practices need to be established for data collection, reporting and database harmonization
  • Transdisciplinary and multi-sectoral collaboration needs to be leveraged to boost awareness and uptake
Copyright Sabin Vaccine Institute 2024
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