Actions Speak Louder Than Words: A Sentiment and Topic Analysis of COVID-19 Vaccination on Twitter and Vaccine Uptake (Preprint)

Abstract

The lack of trust in vaccines is a major contributor to vaccine hesitancy. To overcome vaccine hesitancy for the COVID-19 vaccine, the Australian government launched multiple public health campaigns to encourage vaccine uptake. This sentiment analysis examines the effect of public health campaigns and COVID-19-related events on sentiment and vaccine uptake.

This study aimed to examine the relationship between sentiment and COVID-19 vaccine uptake and government actions that impacted public sentiment about the vaccine.

Using machine learning methods, we collected 137,523 publicly available English language tweets published in Australia between February and October 2021 that contained COVID-19 vaccine–related keywords. Machine learning methods were used to extract topics and sentiments relating to COVID-19 vaccination. The relationship between public vaccination sentiment on Twitter and vaccine uptake were examined.

The majority of collected tweets expressed negative (91,052, 66%), rather than positive (21,686, 16%) or neutral (24,785, 18%), sentiments. Topics discussed within the study timeframe included the role of the government in the vaccination rollout, availability and accessibility of the vaccine, and vaccine efficacy. There was a significant positive correlation between negative sentiment and the number of vaccine doses administered daily (r(267) = 0.15, p<.05), with positive sentiment showing the inverse effect. Public health campaigns, lockdowns and anti-vaccination protests were associated with increased negative sentiment, while vaccination mandates had no significant effect on sentiment.

The study findings demonstrate that negative sentiment was more prevalent on Twitter during the Australian vaccination rollout, but vaccine uptake remained high. Australians expressed anger at the slow rollout and the limited availability of the vaccine during the study period. Public health campaigns, lockdowns and anti-vaccination rallies increased negative sentiment. In contrast, news of increased vaccine availability for the public and government acquisition of more doses were key government actions that reduced negative sentiment. These findings can be used to inform government communication planning.