ABSTRACT

Although previous inquiry into resistance to the polio vaccines in northern Nigeria has been launched from several disciplines, inquiry has been limited to the 2003 revolt and has rarely been informed by theory. This study drew on the culture-centered approach to health communication to argue that the exclusion of marginalized communities from decision-making by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) resulted in a vaccine resistance which found expression in health activism that engaged the local news media. To recover the excluded voices, this study examined community members’ narratives of resistance to the vaccines in Nigerian news from 2012 to 2018. Upon providing a backdrop for these narratives through a chronology of GPEI milestones in northern Nigeria developed from Nigerian newspapers, the study then engaged with 168 speech acts of resistance in Nigerian news to co-construct alternative meanings of health. Drawing on a local cultural meaning of the vaccines as covertly carrying out a Western family-planning agenda, narrators negligibly associated “family planning” with health. Narrators further articulated health as access to foods and as religious practice. These findings have implications for the inclusion of voices from sub-Saharan Africa in GPEI decision-making.

摘要

尽管先前对尼日利亚北部脊髓灰质炎疫苗耐药性的调查已经从多个学科展开，但调查仅限于 2003 年的起义，很少有理论依据。本研究采用以文化为中心的健康传播方法，认为全球根除脊髓灰质炎行动 (GPEI) 将边缘化社区排除在决策之外导致疫苗抗药性，这种抗药性在当地新闻媒体参与的健康行动主义中得到体现. 为了恢复被排除在外的声音，本研究调查了 2012 年至 2018 年尼日利亚新闻中社区成员对疫苗抗性的叙述。在通过尼日利亚报纸开发的尼日利亚北部 GPEI 里程碑年表为这些叙述提供背景后，然后，该研究与尼日利亚新闻中的 168 种言语抵抗行为进行了合作，共同构建了健康的替代意义。叙述者利用疫苗的当地文化意义作为秘密执行西方的计划生育议程，将“计划生育”与健康联系起来可以忽略不计。叙述者进一步将健康描述为获得食物和宗教习俗。这些发现对于将来自撒哈拉以南非洲的声音纳入 GPEI 决策具有重要意义。