The Union Ministry of Health & Family Welfare (MoHFW) is very concerned with the growing Covid infection rate in the North Eastern states. When the numbers in the rest of the country have fallen and the lockdown has been eased even in states like Delhi, where the numbers were very high in April-May this year, the growing Covid cases in the eight states is worrying. The Ministry has reached out to media persons to disseminate the message of adopting Covid Appropriate Behaviour (CAB) which is essentially masking (double or triple layer), physical distancing and hand hygiene. But the worry for the North eastern states, particularly the tribal dominated areas is their vaccine hesitancy. It appears that people are more inclined to believe social media messages particularly those coming via WhatsApp. And if the messages come from the western world, then people tend to take them as gospel, even if these emanate from conspiracy theorists.
A large chunk of Christians, not necessarily from the mainline churches but from radical Christian groups have openly defied the government exhortations to be vaccinated. Several groups have stated that as citizens of a democracy they have the right to choose not to be vaccinated. In this case the rights of a few not to be vaccinated militates against the rights of others not to be infected by those who refuse the vaccine. There are those who argue that if the vaccine is effective then why do those who are vaccinated still carry the risk of contracting Covid and infecting others. Such skeptics abound despite the statistics which show that those who are vaccinated suffer from less serious consequences from Covid and might not need hospitalization.
But one message that troubles many is that the vaccine causes infertility. For a tribal society that believes in procreation as a reason for being born into this earth any intervention that threatens to disrupt that process is taken very seriously. Another fear created by conspiracy theorists is that people would die within two years of taking the vaccine. As far as Meghalaya is concerned, the Health Department has done all within its power to dispel the myths around the vaccine. In fact, the DHS and his cohorts are almost exasperated by the vaccine resistance. Perhaps one missing link is the pro-active involvement of the Dorbar Shnong in this exercise. The Dorbar Shnong have a way of communicating with their people in their own dialects which has an immediate connect. The Government would do well to involve the Dorbar Shnong in this important exercise of social messaging.
