Anti-vaccine billboard which received 140 complaints to be pulled

An anti-vaccination billboard alongside Auckland's southern motorway which prompted more than 140 complaints is being pulled, the day after it was erected.

The billboard, beside the Ōtāhuhu off ramp and close to Middlemore Hospital, features a man holding a baby and the question: "If you knew the ingredients in a vaccine, would you RISK it?"

It was put up by the Warnings About Vaccine Expectations (WAVES NZ) organisation on October 1 for 'Vaccine Injury Awareness Month'. 

Advertising Standards Authority chief executive Hilary Souter said it had received a significant number of complaints relating to the billboard.

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At 1.30pm, Ad-Vantage Media director Duncan Harris told Stuff the billboard would be removed on Tuesday afternoon. 

Harris said the company was "a bit naïve" about the issue and would "tread a bit carefully" in the future. 

Immunisation Advisory Centre research director Dr Helen Petousis-Harris said the billboard perpetuated the myth there are concealed issues with what's in vaccines, which is "most unhelpful and quite untrue".

"It's absolutely misleading."

Petousis-Harris said the billboard had the potential to "hugely" impact public health, and said its placement in south Auckland targets vulnerable communities who "bear the biggest burden of these infectious diseases".

She "shudders to think" how many people would see it in the space of a month.

"[For] people who are already a little bit hesitant or might have some concerns, this has the capacity to reinforce those ideas and make them nervous ... they're the ones who will be most impacted by this kind of messaging".

Petousis-Harris said it was important to clarify that when people talk about chemicals in vaccines, these are chemicals present in the environment that we come into contact with daily, and that we are born with in our bodies.

"The chemicals in vaccines - just like in our mother's breast milk - are in minuscule amounts and pose no safety risk whatsoever to humans and animals in those quantities, with the exception of course of an allergic reaction." 

In a statement on Tuesday, WAVES NZ spokesperson Truly Godfrey said the group had received from the Advertising Standards tribunal a file of 151 complaints.

"Despite the removal of the billboard, we will be defending the complaints to the Advertising Standards Authority, because we believe that broad reading, including medication datasheets and the ingredients of every drug, or vaccine, should be the very basis of informed consent in any medical procedure," Godfrey said.

​​On its Facebook page, WAVES NZ said the billboard "poses the question of whether or not people would vaccinate if they knew what vaccines contained, as many parents aren't aware of the contents of a vaccine".

The post quoted Godfrey as saying: "In the wake of the tragic deaths of two babies in Samoa and the revelations that no safety reports have been provided since 1986 in the United States, despite government agencies being tasked with doing so, we are asking ... [would you risk it]".

Wellington resident Matt Weldon-Smith complained to the ASA after seeing photos of the Auckland billboard circulating online.

"I'm upset that the spread of this misinformation is getting further and getting more published in New Zealand, to be honest," father-of-two Weldon-Smith said.

With the outbreaks of whooping cough, Welon-Smith said he didn't want people to think not vaccinating their children was an informed choice.

"It's scaremongering," he said.

He didn't agree with the argument anti-vaccinators used in relation to vaccine ingredients, as reading the ingredients and understanding what they were and what they did were two different things, he said.

"It's a whole lot of people that have a limited, at best, understanding of science reading something that sounds scary without understanding it has gone through vigorous testing and stuff like that."

"It's disappointing that this is spreading and it's going to affect very vulnerable people in our society."

A Counties Manukau Health spokesperson said the DHB had no direct relationship to the billboard. 

"We do not support anti-vaccine messages.We promote vaccination as a proven step to prevent illness in both children and adults," it said in a statement.