Washington (AFP)

France, the homeland of vaccination pioneer Louis Pasteur, is the country most skeptical of vaccines: one in three French do not believe they are safe, according to a global survey released Wednesday.

The study conducted by the US Gallup polling institute for the British medical NGO Wellcome is the first of its kind: 140,000 people over 15 years of age polled in 2018, in 144 countries, about what they think of science, health professionals and vaccines.

People in rich countries have the least confidence in vaccines, especially in Europe. A phenomenon to be compared with the development of anti-vaccine sentiment, considered as one of the factors of the return of measles in developed countries.

The gap is blatant with Bangladesh or Rwanda, where almost everyone says they have confidence in vaccines.

"In these countries, there are more contagious diseases, and their inhabitants no doubt see what happens when one is not vaccinated," says AFP Imran Khan, who led study for Wellcome.

"In the United States and France, when you are not vaccinated, you have less risk of getting sick (...) and when you are contaminated, you are less likely to die," he says. this "the effect of letting go".

In this attitude of mistrust, France is followed by Gabon, Togo, Russia and Switzerland. The rejection is a little less (19%) when we ask the French if they believe the vaccines "effective".

Elements specific to France explain this distrust, already apparent in previous studies.

"A number of health scandals have weakened the confidence of citizens," says AFP French professor Alain Fischer, responsible for a report of recommendations on vaccines in 2016.

These scandals are those of the Mediator, a drug believed to be responsible for hundreds of deaths, and tainted blood - the discovery in the early 1990s of many infections with the AIDS virus after blood transfusions.

- "False news" -

Beyond these very real scandals, a large vaccination campaign against hepatitis B in 1994 raised suspicions of a link with multiple sclerosis. After more than 17 years of investigation, the Parisian investigating judges dismissed the case in March 2016. Reason: the absence of "certain causality", on which scientists insist.

Another "mistake" of the public authorities, according to Prof. Fischer: the mass vaccination campaign against influenza A / H1N1 late 2009, oversized.

"It will take long-term educational efforts to counter this distrust fueled by floods of false news" on the internet, he predicts.

In fact, vaccination is particularly vulnerable to "conspiracy theories", notes the director of Conspiracy Watch, Rudy Reichstadt.

This observatory published in February a study on conspiracy in France, in partnership with the Jean Jaurès Foundation. 43% of respondents agreed with this sentence: "The Ministry of Health is in cahoots with the pharmaceutical industry to hide the reality of the harmfulness of vaccines to the general public".

"Of the ten conspiracy theories (also concerning Lady Di's accident or September 11th), the one on vaccines was the only one where there were more people agree than disagree," Reichstadt says. AFP.

However, all those who are suspicious of vaccines are not conspirators.

"The hesitant, the mass, who are not militant anti-vaccines, (...) are in deficit of information", emphasizes especially Pr Fischer, insisting on the importance "explanations and accompaniment" to provide.

According to the French health authorities, this is beginning to bear fruit, since the passage of three to eleven compulsory vaccines for children born after January 1, 2018.

A survey published in April shows that 91% of parents of children under two think vaccination is important, five points higher than in June 2018.

In addition, the government emphasizes that vaccination coverage has increased since the increase in the number of compulsory vaccines.

? 2019 AFP