“HPV Vaccination Is Right”: Analysis of HPV-Related Tweets From The Perspective of Public Health Social Work

Abstract

Human Papillomavirus (HPV) is one of the common sexually transmitted infections and is one of the main causes of urogenital cancers. Public health studies are required to combat this infectious agent and the diseases it causes. Public health social work operates in this field; works to determine the social perception of these infections with macro applications. Individuals in society share their views on the subject on social media. To evaluate these views, it was aimed to analyze the tweets about HPV from the perspective of public health social work in this study. Content analysis of 657 tweets shared on Twitter with the hashtags #rahimağzıkanserihpv, #hpvasasıucretsizolsun, #HPV, #HPVAşısı, #hpvtedavisi between 18.06.2021-18.12.2021 was carried out with the MAXQDA. After the data were acquired, their coding was done; data is categorized according to its content and subject; The categories thought to be related to each other were brought together to form themes. In the analysis, 26 categories were created with five themes. These were presented as the social dimension of HPV, policy recommendations, awareness-raising studies for the vaccine, emotional reactions, and the free of charge of the vaccine. It has been concluded that public health social work is necessary to eliminate the lack of information about HPV, to create public awareness about the HPV vaccine, to offer the vaccine free of charge, and to support preventive services.