The social media company Facebook has announced that it is planning to ban the ads against people getting vaccinated. Timed to the beginning of flu season, the new policy is also aimed at the ongoing proliferation of anti-vaccine groups on Facebook and growing skepticism about forthcoming vaccines for COVID-19.

“Our goal is to help messages about the safety and efficacy of vaccines reach a broad group of people, while prohibiting ads with misinformation that could harm public health efforts,” the company said in a blog post. “We don’t want these ads on our platform.”

Facebook’s previous rules prohibited ads containing vaccine misinformation or hoaxes identified by leading health organizations, but allowed ads opposing vaccines if they did not contain false claims.

This summer, Facebook Public Policy Manager Jason Hirsch told Reuters the company believed users should be able to express personal anti-vaccine views and that more aggressive censorship could push people hesitant about vaccines towards the anti-vaccine camp.

Facebook will also start directing U.S. users this week to information about the flu vaccine and how to get it, according to the company’s Head of Health and Director of Product Management in a blog post.

Facebook is working with public health partners like the World Health Organization and UNICEF on messaging campaigns to increase immunization rates, they added.

Anti-vaccine content and misinformation about the new COVID-19 vaccines have flourished on social media platforms including Facebook during the coronavirus pandemic, researchers told Reuters earlier this year.

” The anti-vaccination groups themselves will continue to be allowed on the platform — organic or unpaid content discouraging vaccination is still permitted, per Facebook’s platform rules.

Alongside the new ads policy, Facebook will actively promote vaccination through a public information campaign, and direct users to vaccination sites using its preventive health tool.

The move also comes at a delicate time for the ongoing pandemic. Public trust about the Covid-19 vaccine has fallen to alarmingly low levels, perhaps driven by President Trump’s frequent references to an imminent vaccine to be released before Election Day.

Source- Reuters