Learning from government communication strategies to promote infant RSV immunisation: A cross-national study of France, Luxembourg, Spain, and Australia

BACKGROUND: In 2023 and 2024, governments around the world, including France, Luxembourg, Spain, and some states in Australia, commenced infant RSV immunisation programs using nirsevimab. To support rollouts of nirsevimab and drive uptake, governments developed communication materials targeting parents and healthcare providers. As yet, little is known about how governments communicated with these audiences about this new immunisation and the extent to which messaging varied between jurisdictions. METHODS: This study comparatively analysed government communications from France, Luxembourg, Spain, and Australia disseminated as part of nirsevimab program rollouts. It engaged in text analysis to identify key components within messaging, and a values expression analysis, drawing on the Schwartz theory of personal values, to provide a systematic understanding of how messaging was presented to parents and healthcare providers, and the specific motivations messaging sought to tap in to. RESULTS: We found three key components in messaging from all jurisdictions: educational, information, and activation messaging. However, while the types of messages were similar, we found country-based differences in how materials presented messages, including risk-framing, use of emotive language, and the extent to which parents were linked to trustworthy sources of information. We further identified that personal values expressions of security, benevolence, and universalism were prevalent across messaging from all jurisdictions, but observed greater prevalence of self-direction values expression in parent targeted materials from France and Australia, and greater conformity expressions in material aimed at healthcare providers. CONCLUSION: Our study reveals how different governments communicated with their population around the introduction of infant RSV immunisation, and how this messaging aimed to encourage uptake. Findings from this study provide insight as to how messaging approaches could be translated and tailored in developing government communications to support infant RSV immunisation implementation and uptake elsewhere in the world, as well as rollout of other prospective immunisation programs.