The slides from the launch of the report Under the skin: Listening to the voices of older people on influenza vaccination. The research is based on interviews with older people in Australia, Japan, the UK and Canada, with a particular focus on influenza immunisation. It will highlight the gaps that need to be addressed to achieve a better protection of older adults against influenza through vaccination.

1. Vaccination in an ageing world:
Listening to older people
#UnderTheSkin

2. Welcome from Chair
Baroness Sally Greengross, ILC
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3. Presentation of Research
Dan Holden, ILC
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4. The challenge
Seasonal flu represents a
significant global public health
challenge, particularly amongst
vulnerable groups like older
people.
Many countries are below the
WHO vaccination target for this
group.
“I think primary care works
really well for kids, we’ve got it
ingrained in our heads to go
take our kids to the GP, to get
them vaccinated, but I just
don’t think it’s working in an
adult space.”
Stakeholder, Australia

5. Why do attitudes matter?
• Evidence to suggest that attitudes are a significant factor in
vaccination take up in countries where the vaccine is readily
available
• As accessibility becomes less of a barrier, attitudes become more
so

6. What did we do
• Conducted qualitative research amongst older adults and public
health stakeholders in:
• UK
• Japan
• Canada
• Australia
• To try and understand to what extent attitudes are a factor in
vaccine uptake and to understand what they are

7. What we found
• Our research backs up wider research that attitudes are a
significant barrier to overcome in increasing vaccination rates, but
also shows that stakeholders often don’t focus on this enough.
• Vaccine hesitancy in the case of seasonal flu vaccines is a
different phenomenon to wider vaccine hesitancy.
• A potentially more effective way of addressing these issues would
be to engage with the public’s positive attitudes toward their own
lifestyles rather than through more traditional messaging.

8. Vaccinations more often associated with
early life
Older people tended to
associate vaccines as
something related to young
people.
When prompted on later life
associations were with flu and
shingles.
“Well, the first one I had was
when I was very young and that
was polio, because there was
still quite a lot of polio around
in Britain.”
Male, UK

9. Mixed associations with ageing
Associations with ageing were
by and large negative, with
some respondents referring to
the body “breaking down” with
ageing.
Some discussion however of
importance of personal effort
and strength of own immune
system.
“They can’t fight these things
off as well as when you’re
younger.”
Female, Australia

10. What are the attitudinal barriers?
The attitudinal barriers broadly
break down into the following
typology:
• Not everyone sees
themselves as vulnerable to
flu.
• Not everyone believes the
vaccine works.
“And if you get your flu
vaccination then you get the
flu.”
Female, UK

11. Implications for policy and action pt. 1
• Still some work to be done on
accessibility issues however
they alone will not do enough
• The same old approach to
public health campaigning
may not work in addressing
these barriers
• The voice of healthcare
professionals is important
“One of the things that we
learned was that older adults
don’t think about vaccination in
isolation, they think about it in
terms of their overall health
care.”
Stakeholder, Canada

12. Implications for policy and action pt. 2
• If there is an assumption of
personal responsibility for
maintaining health and in
prevention, we have to
understand that older people
are active and may not
“Even people I’ve spoken to
who are well into their 80s,
who consider themselves to be
healthy and, therefore, they
perceive something like the flu
vaccine to be a very good thing
for the vulnerable older people,
of which they’re not one.”
Stakeholder, UK

13. Panel responses
Dr Martin Friede, WHO
Dr Jane Barratt, IFA
Laura Tamblyn Watts, CARP
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14. Q&A
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15. Closing remarks
Islene Araujo de Carvalho, WHO
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16. Close
Baroness Sally Greengross, ILC
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