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Questions about 'why vaccines keep changing' spread in South Asian parent groups, particularly in Pakistan and India, and appeared in blog articles in the Philippines. On X, a widely shared post asked, 'OPV yesterday, IPV today — is it really safe?' Such comments fueled perceptions of inconsistency, despite only 14 posts being recorded. The reach, however, was significant: over 6 million, concentrated among parent forums and news blogs. The narrative is not massive in volume but is highly influential, preying on confusion and amplifying doubts during program transitions.

Across Nigerian Facebook groups and East African Telegram channels, memes circulated accusing Bill Gates and 'Big Pharma' of using Africans as guinea pigs. Posts paired images of children with captions like 'Experiments on African bodies for Western profit.' On X, conspiracy influencers from the US and UK amplified the same content, linking it to broader anti-elite tropes about profit and control. The narrative blended genuine grievances about inequities with exaggerated claims of exploitation. The simultaneous posting of identical memes across platforms, peaking at nearly 400 posts in 48 hours, suggests coordinated amplification. With an estimated reach of 129 million, it stands out as one of the most dangerous narratives.

In mid-August, parents and commentators in Pakistan and Afghanistan began posting that 'the OPV itself creates polio outbreaks.' Threads on X quickly gained traction with frightening anecdotes, while YouTube videos such as 'Children paralyzed by the vaccine itself' were reposted in large Facebook groups. Triggered by media coverage of cVDPV cases, the technical explanation — that mutation only occurs where vaccination coverage is low — was omitted, leaving space for alarmist interpretations. Within 48 hours, over 140 posts repeated the same claim, driving the narrative to an estimated reach of more than 60 million. The combination of parental voices, emotionally charged videos, and the echo of Facebook groups turned a nuanced epidemiological reality into a viral claim of vaccine failure.

African social media users are sharing threads about Hilary Koprowski’s 1950s oral polio vaccine trials in the Belgian Congo, describing them as “Africa’s most horrific vaccination experiment” and implying a connection to the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Although this hypothesis has been debunked, the narrative leverages historical colonial abuses to suggest presentday polio campaigns are unsafe or unethical. This can amplify distrust in vaccination efforts across the continent.