Health and Global Policy Institute (HGPI) has released policy recommendations entitled, “Recommendations on Structuring Communication Strategies for Better Understanding of Immunization and Vaccination Policy.”

Establishing immunization and vaccine policies based on life course factors was considered an important issue in the policy recommendations released previously by the HGPI in June 2021 entitled, “A Life Course Approach to Immunization and Vaccination Policy – Five Perspectives and Recommended Actions.” The HGPI brought together experts with a shared sense of need to tackle this issue and summarized their discussions. The current recommendations are a summary of that discussion, including key points regarding future initiatives. Through these recommendations, we hope that Japan’s immunization and vaccine policies will be promoted, that discussions will expand in within the industry, government, academia and civil society.

 

1. Essential conditions for communication

Important conditions and items to reaffirm before engaging in discussions on communication issues

• The importance of organizing issues in communication
• Taking underlying social and cultural factors into account is a key condition for communication

2. The basis for information transmission

Ensuring information reaches those who are uninterested

• The need for concentrated efforts to reach uninterested people and similar segments of the population

Information transmission channels

• Information transmission channels that are expected to play larger roles in the future and their inherent challenges

Stakeholder literacy

• Where channels exist, but with literacy issues among certain stakeholders

Methods of transmitting information and content

• The need to exercise more ingenuity for information transmission methods and content

3. Making information transmission more sophisticated

Stakeholder cooperation and collaboration

• Collaboration and cooperation among different stakeholders that surpass individual stakeholders

Building frameworks with the perspective of achieving even more sophisticated communication

• Past efforts to build frameworks from various differing perspectives

4. Two-way communication

Achieving communication that goes both ways

• Achieving mutual communication to make it easier for citizens to seek consultations

5. Necessary steps for new policy formation

Communication for new policy formation

• The need for more effective communication that maximizes on past experiences and is based on a clear understanding of objectives
• Reinforcing support for stakeholders to whom the Basic Plan for Immunization will assign roles in communicating and sharing information

 

■Working Group 2 “Communication” Members (Titles omitted; in alphabetical order by last name (as of 2021))

Working Group Members

• Kyoko Ama (Representative, Children and Healthcare Project)
• Mamoru Ichikawa (Visiting Scholar, Stanford University; Representative, Association of Medical Journalism; Visiting Associate Professor, School of Medicine, Hiroshima University; Manager of Fund Development and Public Policy, READYFOR, Inc.)
• Yuko Umeyama (Governance & Operational Excellence Department, Global Vaccine Business Unit, Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited)
• Takahiro Kinoshita (Vice Representative, Minpapi! Let’s Learn About HPV Project; Vice Representative, CoV-Navi)
• Tomoko Koike (Associate Professor, Faculty of Nursing and Medical Care/Graduate School of Health Management, Keio University)
• Aya Saitoh (Associate Professor, Department of Health Sciences, Graduate School of Health Sciences, Niigata University)
• Mikihito Tanaka (Professor, Journalism Course, Graduate School of Political Science, Waseda University; Professor, School of Political Science and Economics, Waseda University)
• Makiko Nakatani (Secretariat, KNOW VPD! Protect Our Children)

 

Special Advisors

• Keizo Takemi (Member, House of Councilors; Chairperson, Association for the Promotion of Improved Public Health through Vaccinations, Parliamentary Group for Vaccines and Prevention)
• Noriko Furuya (Member, House of Representatives; Acting Chairperson, Association for the Promotion of Improved Public Health through Vaccinations, Parliamentary Group for Vaccines and Prevention)