When Colleagues Spread Misinformation About Vaccines: What You Can Do

When Colleagues Spread Misinformation About Vaccines: What You Can Do

It’s 11:30 p.m. You’re on call in a community hospital. Between pages, you’re in the workroom, and two nurses and a senior physician are talking. One of them says, “Honestly, I don’t recommend the COVID boosters anymore. Too many side effects and they don’t really work for healthy people.” Everyone nods, except you.

You know that’s wrong. You know your hospital is pushing vaccination. And you just watched a young, unvaccinated patient struggle on BiPAP last week.

But this is your colleague. Maybe your attending. Maybe your preceptor. Maybe the popular nurse that basically runs the floor. You feel that familiar knot: Do you confront them? Do you let it go? Are you obligated to report this? Are you going to look like the annoying “policy police” if you speak up?

This is where most people freeze.

Let’s not freeze. Here’s how to think about it and what to actually do, step by step, in real life.

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Step 1: Get Clear On What You’re Actually Dealing With

You can’t respond well if you’re not precise about the problem. “Misinformation about vaccines” covers a huge range, from mildly confused to outright dangerous.

Break it down into three questions:

1. Is this clearly factually wrong, or just incomplete / sloppy?

   • Wrong: “Flu shots cause the flu.”
   • Sloppy: “Flu shots are pointless; they don’t work at all.” (There’s a real conversation to have about effectiveness, strain match, risk groups.)

2. Is it happening in front of patients/public or just between staff?

   • Between staff in a break room.
   • In a clinic room with a patient.
   • On social media with their name and “MD” or “RN” all over the profile.

3. Is this casual talk, or an established pattern / advocacy?

   • One off, vague skepticism.
   • Repeated strongly anti-vaccine messaging.
   • Active advice: “I tell my patients to skip this one.”

Your obligations and your strategy escalate as you move from:

• private, one-off, mild to
• public, repeated, strong, and clinically consequential.

You don’t treat a scrubs-room eye-roll the same way you treat an attending giving anti-vax counseling in clinic. Or you shouldn’t.

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Step 2: Your Ethical Obligations vs. Your Career Reality

You have competing truths here:

• As a health professional, you owe patients accurate, evidence-based information. Vaccine misinformation leads to preventable harm. That’s not theoretical.
• As a trainee or junior staff, you have limited power and real vulnerability. You can be punished in subtle ways: bad evals, fewer opportunities, social isolation.

Here’s the blunt version: You are not required to martyr your career in one dramatic confrontation to be an ethical person. But you are required not to become complicit in harm.

So your priorities:

1. Stop immediate harm to patients when it’s happening in front of you, even if you do it gently.
2. Minimize your own risk by choosing methods and allies wisely.
3. Document patterns, don’t rely on vague impressions.
4. Use escalation pathways that exist (or build informal ones).

We’ll walk through what that looks like in different scenarios.

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Step 3: Scripts For Real-Time, In-Person Situations

Start with the most common and lowest-risk setting: casual talk among staff.

A. Break room / workroom: “I don’t trust these vaccines”

Scenario: Colleague in the workroom says, “I tell my family to skip the HPV vaccine. Too many unknowns.”

You have three broad options: redirect, probe, or correct. You’re picking based on power dynamics and your tolerance.

Low-risk “nudge” (good with senior people you don’t want to fight):

• “The data I’ve seen has been pretty solid on safety and cancer prevention. Have you seen something different recently?”
• “That’s interesting. Last grand rounds we got almost the opposite message–that we’re under-using HPV vaccination.”

You’re not attacking. You’re signaling: there is evidence, and you’re not just going to nod.

More direct but still respectful:

• “I’ll be honest, the evidence on HPV vaccines is one of the more robust vaccine datasets we have. Cervical cancer rates drop. Side effects are usually mild. If you’re hearing otherwise, it might be from low-quality sources.”
• “We’re going to confuse people if we go off the guidelines in casual conversations like this, especially when they overhear us.”

If they push back into a debate, you can opt out gracefully:

• “I don’t think we’re going to agree right now, but from a patient care perspective, I’m going to stick with ACIP/CDC recommendations. That’s what I’ll be counseling based on.”

The hidden win here: other people listening hear that there is not unanimous support for the misinformation.

B. In front of a patient: now you have a duty

Scenario: You’re in clinic. The attending tells a patient, “I don’t think you need the flu shot; it doesn’t work and can cause serious side effects.”

This is different. You are now witnessing active harm. You do not get to shrug and blame “hierarchy” forever.

You still have to be smart. Two moves: in-room micro-correction, and post-visit repair.

In the room (if you can safely interject):

Aim to correct without openly humiliating your senior.

• “Just to add one thing—current CDC guidance does recommend the flu shot for you given your asthma. Serious side effects are rare, but we always watch for them. Maybe we can talk through pros and cons?”

If the attending shuts you down, do not escalate in front of the patient. You’ve signaled your position. Then:

After the visit (with the attending):

• “I was a little uncomfortable with the way we framed the flu shot. The guidelines are pretty clear that someone with her risk factors should get it. I worry that patients might miss out on protection.”
• “If you’re okay with it, I’d like to review the current recommendations; I think they might have changed since some older data.”

Yes, this can be awkward. But over and over I’ve seen attendings soften when they realize someone is actually looking at current guidelines instead of vibes and Facebook.

After the visit (with the patient – if appropriate and allowed):

Sometimes you can catch them briefly, especially if you’re the one rooming or doing education.

• “I just wanted to add that if you have any questions about vaccines or want to revisit them, here’s the CDC patient handout. Guidelines do recommend the flu shot for people with your health conditions. If you’d like, we can schedule a follow-up to talk more.”

Do not openly trash your colleague: “Ignore what Dr. X said.” That can backfire for everyone and also looks unprofessional.

C. Group setting / huddle / staff meeting

If someone drops misinformation publicly in a meeting, do not let it stand unchallenged. You don’t have to fight, but you do have to mark it.

Example: In huddle, a senior nurse says, “A lot of us think it’s better not to push the COVID booster on pregnant patients. Too many unknowns.”

You can respond:

• “Just to clarify, ACOG and CDC both recommend COVID vaccination and boosters in pregnancy, with good safety data so far. We should probably make sure our patient education lines up with that.”

Then stop talking. Let the silence sit. You’ve done your job.

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Step 4: Evidence Without Being That Person Who Brings 80 PDFs

You do not win these battles by dumping PubMed on people. You win by having clean, ready references and using them sparingly.

Have 3–4 go-to sources bookmarked or saved on your phone:

Source	What To Use It For
CDC (ACIP)	Current vaccine recommendations
WHO	Global positions and safety data
ACOG/AAP	Pregnancy & pediatrics guidance
Hospital Policy	Local standard of care

When someone makes a strong claim:

• “That’s not what I’ve seen from ACIP. Let me pull up the latest recommendation.”
• “Our hospital policy actually follows CDC guidance on this. It says we should be offering it.”

If they start quoting low-quality sources (YouTube, fringe blogs):

• “That source has been pretty consistently flagged for misrepresenting data. If we’re going to change how we counsel patients, I’d want to see it reflected in CDC/WHO/major specialty guidelines.”

You’re drawing a line around what counts as legitimate.

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Step 5: When It’s Repeated And Harmful – Escalation

At some point, it’s not one weird comment. It’s a pattern.

Example patterns:

• A preceptor repeatedly discourages vaccines in clinic.
• An NP on the unit tells multiple patients “I wouldn’t get that shot if I were you.”
• A colleague’s public social media, with hospital identifiers, is actively anti-vaccine.

Now we’re in reportable territory.

A. Start documenting. Quietly.

You’re not building a novel. Just enough so that when you speak up, you’re not saying, “I feel like they’re anti-vax.”

Start a private log (not on hospital equipment if you’re worried):

• Date/time
• Who was present
• Exact or close paraphrased statements
• Whether a patient was present
• Any immediate impact (e.g., “patient declined vaccine after that statement”)

Pattern beats vibe. Admins care about pattern.

B. Find allies at the right level

Instead of going straight to the CMO, find the closest safe step:

• Program director
• Trusted attending known to be pro-vaccine / policy-savvy
• Chief resident
• Infection control / vaccine program lead
• Risk management or quality office (larger systems)

The script:

• “I’ve noticed a pattern of [X colleague] giving patients information about vaccines that conflicts pretty directly with CDC/ACIP and our policies. I’m concerned about patient harm and also liability for the institution. Here are a few examples with dates. What’s the right way to handle this?”

You’re not venting. You’re putting patient safety and institutional risk on the table. That’s language administrators respond to.

C. Formal reporting

If your informal route fails or the behavior is egregious, use formal mechanisms:

• Incident reporting system (many have categories for “inappropriate counseling” or “deviation from standard of care”).
• Confidential professionalism / ethics reporting channels.
• Licensing board only in extreme, repeated, or dangerous cases, and usually not as your first step unless mandated.

And yes, retaliation is real. If you’re in a toxic place with a known retaliation culture, be strategic: anonymous options, group reporting, or waiting until you’ve graduated/rotated off if the behavior is serious but not immediately life-threatening.

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Step 6: Social Media And Public Misinformation By Colleagues

Someone in your hospital has a TikTok where they wear hospital-branded gear and say, “I would never give my kids the MMR; it’s too risky.”

Now you’re in a different lane: reputation, trust, and institutional risk.

A. Check your institution’s policies first

Most hospitals and schools have:

• Social media policies about identifying yourself as staff.
• Professionalism policies about public statements that conflict with standard of care.

Read them. Screenshot them. Know what they say about using titles and logos.

B. Decide if you’re engaging directly (usually don’t)

Arguing in their comment section is almost always pointless and can expose you. A better play:

• Collect a few representative posts (links, screenshots).
• Bring them to the same kind of ally as above: PD, medical staff office, PR, or risk management.

Again, use the right frame:

• “I’m concerned this creates confusion about our institution’s stance on vaccines and conflicts with our own guidelines. It could affect patient trust and pose liability issues.”

If they wear your logo and list your hospital, it’s the institution’s problem, not just yours.

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Step 7: Managing Your Own Emotions And Staying Effective

You will feel anger. Sometimes disgust. Sometimes fear. All normal.

The trick is: anger may be justified, but it’s rarely persuasive. You want to stay in a range where you can think clearly.

Some practical things:

• Have 2–3 go-to phrases ready so you’re not improvising while angry:

  • “That’s not consistent with current guidelines.”
  • “The evidence base doesn’t support that conclusion.”
  • “We should be careful not to overstate risks when the data don’t.”

• Pick your battles. You do not have to correct every eyebrow raise and vague “I don’t know about these shots.” Focus on:

  • Statements made to patients.
  • Statements in official contexts (meetings, education).
  • Clear, concrete misinformation (“vaccines cause infertility,” “these are experimental”).

• Protect your credibility. Don’t exaggerate or overstate. Example: “Vaccines are 100% safe” is false and will get you destroyed by one rare adverse event. Say, “Serious side effects are very rare, and the benefits for someone in your risk group are much larger than the risks.”

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Step 8: Building A Pro-Vaccine Culture Around You

You’re not just putting out fires. Long-term, you want fewer fires.

Practical moves:

• Suggest a short vaccine update in residency didactics or nursing education (“Can infection control give a 20-minute update on current vaccine data?”).
• Volunteer to help with patient-facing materials. Clear handouts reduce how much people rely on hallway conversations.
• Support colleagues who do speak up. A simple, “I appreciated you bringing guidelines into that discussion,” after a meeting matters.

And with junior learners and students, model it. Every time you say, “Let’s check what ACIP says,” you normalize checking instead of just spouting anecdotes.

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Visual: Escalation Path For Vaccine Misinformation

Escalation Path for Colleague Vaccine Misinformation

Step	Description
Step 1	Hear Misinformation
Step 2	Correct gently in room if safe
Step 3	Clarify after visit
Step 4	Informal conversation
Step 5	Document instances
Step 6	Discuss with trusted senior
Step 7	Formal report or ethics consult
Step 8	In front of patient
Step 9	Pattern or one time
Step 10	Resolved

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FAQ (Exactly 3 Questions)

1. Am I legally required to report colleagues who spread vaccine misinformation?

Usually you’re not under a blanket legal requirement for every instance of misinformation, but you are under professional and often institutional obligations to address behavior that risks patient harm. The closer it is to clear deviation from standard of care with direct patient impact, the more you shift from “optional” to “expected” reporting. When in doubt, talk confidentially with a program director, ombudsperson, or ethics office before going formal.

2. What if I’m a student or intern and the person is my evaluator?

Then you prioritize two things: immediate patient safety and your own career survival. In the room with a patient, use very gentle corrections and lean heavily on “guidelines say…” wording. Outside the room, you can choose lower-risk strategies: ask curious questions, bring up guidelines, and quietly document if there’s a pattern. Use intermediaries—chief residents, clerkship directors, or course leadership—rather than confronting a powerful evaluator directly. You do not have to blow up your career to be ethical, but you also should not participate in spreading misinformation yourself.

3. What if the colleague insists “this is my personal opinion” and accuses me of silencing them?

They’re allowed personal opinions. They’re not allowed to provide substandard care or misinform patients under the banner of professional authority. The line is simple: once you’re speaking as “Doctor” or “Nurse” or “Pharmacist” to patients or the public, you don’t get to substitute opinion for evidence. You can say: “You’re absolutely entitled to your personal views. Our responsibility here, though, is to align our patient counseling and public statements with evidence-based guidelines and our institution’s policies. That’s what I’m going to follow.”

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Key takeaways:

1. Treat casual staff-room skepticism differently from repeated, patient-facing misinformation—but do not let either go completely unchallenged.
2. Use guidelines, institutional policy, and documented patterns as your backbone; they protect both patients and you.
3. Pick your moments, protect your credibility, and focus your energy where it actually changes patient outcomes.