• On Sunday, the federal government said it was abandoning any plans to use paid Facebook advertising amid a fight with the tech giant over paying for news.
• But a COVID-19 misinformation and science denialism researcher said the launch of a crucial vaccine roll-out is not the time to leave Facebook.
• He said the targeting capacity of Facebook advertising is crucial to addressing demographics who are reporting rising vaccine hesitancy.
• Visit Business Insider Australia’s homepage for more stories.

Two of Australia’s biggest stories last week have unexpectedly collided – and the result could have consequences for Australia’s effort to combat COVID-19.

On Thursday, Facebook pulled news from its services in a battle over the government’s plan to force the tech giant to pay for news.

Meanwhile, Australia began to administer its first COVID-19 vaccines, amid a campaign to inform people about the safety and efficacy of the jab.

These two ideas came to a head when the Australian government said they too could play hardball by cancelling all plans for advertising on Facebook.

On Sunday, Health Minister Greg Hunt said that government would now ditch Facebook for other platforms and social media, according to the Australian’s Ben Packham.

Prior to this, the government had heavily used Facebook advertising for outreach about the vaccine and their campaigns more broadly. In 2019-20, the federal government spent $42 million on digital advertising.

While Facebook does provide some free advertising credits for government, the Department of Health had previously planned on spending part of its $24 million advertising campaign on social media advertising.

This move has been criticised as a political stunt amid a public health crisis that could undermine the campaign to defeat the virus.

Matt Nurse is a PhD researcher at the Australian National University who is investigating misinformation and science denialism during the COVID-19 pandemic.

He slammed the move, saying “now’s not the time to vacate the platform.”

“To stop the lockdowns and lives being lost, Australia needs to vaccinate as quick as possible,” he told Business Insider Australia.

Abandoning the platform and its 19 million users would leave a vacuum of high quality information about the vaccine from the government, and may even cede ground to bad actors spreading misinformation.

“That makes Australia’s COVID-19 infodemic worse,” Nurse said.

Nurse spoke about the value of Facebook’s micro-targeting ability and how that is particularly useful for addressing different groups in Australia who are vaccine hesitant.

Research about attitudes towards the COVID-19 vaccine shows that there are groups with increasing concerns including women, Indigenous Australians, those who don’t speak English at home and Australians who haven’t finished year 12.

Unlike broader advertising like television campaigns or billboards, Facebook allows advertisers to send custom messages to specific groups based on their demographics or interests.

“You can help people who speak another language by providing details in their language. You can help those working in healthcare to get the latest information about the vaccine. You can help small business owners by telling them that vaccinations will end the lockdowns and help get their businesses back on track,” Nurse said.

Nurse says that it’s concerning that longitudinal research has shown that more than a third of Australians have become less willing to get the vaccine over the course of the pandemic between August 2020 and January 2021.

There are four rough groups: those who definitely will, those who probably will, those who probably won’t, and those who definitely won’t.

While the group of people who definitely won’t get get the vaccine has only increased by 2.5%, the trend has been moving away from vaccine certainty.

“That’s not to say we should be worried,” Nurse said. “It’s a wake-up call to invest in more targeted measures.

“We can’t just rely on organic reach.”

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