"I trust Sanofi more than Pfizer": a tricolor vaccine to convince the hesitant?

From monumental as it was at the start of the vaccination campaign, the obstacle has shrunk as it has intensified; it must nevertheless be recognized that hostility to the vaccine persists among a marginal but not insignificant fringe of French society. Admittedly, the intermediary of general practitioners has been able to remove barriers; of course also, the end of the logistical hiccups has increased confidence and silenced some bad language on social networks. The fact remains that two out of ten French people still refuse to be vaccinated, and that apart from the threat of a vaccination obligation (which perhaps does not help matters), they remain difficult to convince. How to overcome the last recalcitrants?

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Among them in reality, the irreducible "antivax" are not legion. “Hesitation is not always synonymous with refusal or resistance,” argue researchers Anne-Marie Moulin (doctor and philosopher, emeritus research director at the CNRS) and Gaëtan Thomas (historian of medicine and science, postdoctoral fellow at Sciences Po), in an article published in Life of Ideas. This is confirmed by Laure Millet, head of the Health Program at the Institut Montaigne: “I place vaccine hesitation apart from the movement of distrust hostile to vaccines. It is not, in most of these people, to oppose an injection on principle, but rather a need to take a step back and wait for guarantees.

A “traditional” vaccine

However, among the main concerns raised by Internet users hesitant to get vaccinated, and whose words have been scrutinized for months by the firm Bloom Social Analytics, messenger RNA technology has crystallized a large part of the reluctance. Consequently, the arrival on the market of a “traditional” vaccine, the one that Sanofi is developing and which could be ready from December, offers a reassuring alternative.

Triumphant, the teams of the French giant (world leader in the vaccine against the flu) do not shy away from their pleasure in finally taking their revenge, after the bad press that the delay in the development of the vaccine has earned them. By announcing on July 5 an availability from December, the president of Sanofi Olivier Bogillot praised the merits of a “proven technology that we had been using for a few years”, carefully recalling that it is already present in the vaccine. against the flu, which does not crystallize so much mistrust.

Message received five out of five: commenting on this announcement, an Internet user wrote on Twitter that we “can admit one thing with intellectual honesty, the Sanofi vaccine has two things that mRNA vaccines do not have: hindsight on the technology used since decades, and the vaccine does not come out in an increased rush, which provides much more confidence”. An argument to which we gladly resort on the side of Sanofi: "This technology has existed for a long time and it is normal that it reassures, since it offers an alternative to new technologies which have emerged with the pandemic, such as messenger RNA or adenovirus. The vaccine that we are combining is based on recombinant protein technology, its results are promising and above all it is historically known in terms of safety, which will probably reassure patients.

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By contrast, the distrust aroused by mRNA technology among some of the hesitant people therefore promotes confidence in a vaccine considered more “traditional”. “I will not get vaccinated with this experimental RNA thing for such a non-lethal disease. It's crisp and clear. I'm waiting to see the recombinant protein vaccine developed by Sanofi, which reassures me more. If it's being antivax, it's good for you... ”comments this other Internet user.

“The brand effect”

In addition to the technology, it is paradoxically its delay which further strengthens the confidence of some French people in the Sanofi vaccine: although it followed exactly the same protocol as the other vaccines for the conduct of clinical studies prior to its (possible) marketing authorization, the duration of its development is perceived by some as a guarantee of seriousness. "It reassures me, in this haste, to know that @sanofine is not botching its studies, not choosing its targets for better commercial brochures but better results on our most fragile" tweets a political leader of the Debout la France movement.

For health economist Nathalie Coulet, the “brand effect” also plays a big role in patient representations. “It is a laboratory that they know, unlike Pfizer which really made itself known in France with the health crisis; while Sanofi, it is they who produce Doliprane. Moreover, this one is made in China and not in France, so it's not so much the 'made in France' argument as really the confidence that the brand inspires that can come into play. This is all the more so since the Sanofi vaccine offers an honorable way out for those who have so far refused other vaccines, in the event of compulsory vaccination. Finally, on condition of not arriving too late...».

The patriotic argument should not be overlooked either: in the comments of Internet users, it also comes up, as in this publication where one of them explains: “I am still not vaccinated, I can't wait for the Sanofi vaccine, I only trust French vaccines! Pasteur is in France, it is with us, all my confidence in them!

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