Video creators banned from sharing vaccine misinformation on YouTube under revamped policies

Content creators on YouTube have been banned from uploading videos promoting Covid-19 vaccine conspiracy theories under a set of new policies.

Video sharing platform YouTube has banned anti-vaxxer content creators from sharing videos containing misinformation about Covid vaccines.

The tech company, owned by Google, announced this week it had updated its community guidelines to ban channels from sharing videos that promoted vaccine hesitancy.

YouTube revealed that its revised medical misinformation policies would take effect from September 29 in line with vaccine advice from health authorities and the World Health Organisation.

Having developed 10 new policies since the outset of the pandemic and subsequently removed more than 130,000 videos for violating them, YouTube has now intensified its approach.

“Working closely with health authorities, we looked to balance our commitment to an open platform with the need to remove egregious harmful content,” it said.

“We’ve steadily seen false claims about the coronavirus vaccines spill over into misinformation about vaccines in general, and we’re now at a point where it’s more important than ever to expand the work we started with Covid-19 to other vaccines.”

YouTube will remove videos that falsely claim approved vaccines are dangerous. Picture: AFP

The new guidelines ban videos that claim approved vaccines to be dangerous or cause chronic health effects, or don’t reduce transmission or contraction of the virus.

Videos containing incorrect information on vaccine ingredients, or wrongly claim the vaccine causes autism, cancer or infertility, or that substances in vaccines can track those who receive them, would also be banned.

“Our policies not only cover specific routine immunisation like for measles or hepatitis B, but also apply to general statements about vaccines,” YouTube said.

While the new policies took effect this week, the company said it would take time for its systems to “fully ramp up enforcement”.

It noted there would be exemptions to the new rules when it came to vaccine policies, new vaccine trials, historical vaccine successes or failures on YouTube, or personal testimonials.

“Today’s policy update is an important step to address vaccine and health misinformation on our platform, and we’ll continue to invest across the board in the policies and products that bring high quality information to our viewers and the entire YouTube community.”