Michael Deml

Sociology, epidemiology, public health – Institut de recherches sociologiques, Université de Genève, Service de soins palliatifs et de support, Centre hospitalier universitaire vaudois

Michael J. Deml, PhD, MA (Mike) conducted his doctoral research in epidemiology and public health at the University of Basel on vaccine decision-making in Switzerland. With the support of qualitative research methods, including semi-structured interviews with parents and healthcare professionals and ethnographic observations of patient-provider consultations, this research investigated the surprisingly understudied and nuanced relationship between complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) and vaccine decisions in Switzerland. Contrary to popular and scientific discourses, the CAM providers and parents who sought advice from them were not categorically “anti-vaccine”. Rather, the emphasis in these interactions was focused on individual choice and did not center around public health considerations. The findings from the focus on physicians with no CAM training revealed how physicians linked vaccine hesitancy and vaccine in terms of moralistic views around “good” and “bad” patients and “good” and “bad doctors.” Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Mike has been involved in many vaccine-related projects, with a strong emphasis on the important roles of healthcare providers in communicating around this topic. He has also completed an 18-month postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Cape Town which focused on the organization of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout from the perspectives and experiences of public health officials, government authorities, and scientists in the Western Cape Province of South Africa.