Salvador Illa, head of TV3 programs

On Monday, Salvador Illa posted a tweet on the X network to protest against the approach of the program Vertex for having given a voice to anti-vaxxers and demanding responsibility for not putting public health at risk. The day before, Ramon Pellicer had introduced the debate on vaccination with a very fragile approach: “This week the flu and covid vaccination campaign has begun and we wanted to look at the other side of this reality: that of people who distrust vaccines”. The program turns a minority position into a counterpart to the vaccination campaign, endorsed with the journalistic cliché of “the other side of reality”. This other side perhaps does not justify so much attention. In any case, the video of the anti-vaccine couple they interviewed did not last more than three minutes and they used very vague arguments. The man said that for him it was more important to smile and hug to maintain good health. They were neither presented as experts nor did they use a falsely scientific discourse. The program, subsequently, dedicated four times more time, twelve minutes, to rebut the arguments of the anti-vaxxers with two expert professionals: Gemma Moncunill, lead researcher of the Caixa Research Institute Group, and Judit Vall, Professor of Applied Economics at the UB, to clarify the aspects linked to the interests of pharmaceutical companies. Both insisted on the benefits of vaccines and Moncunill stressed that it was advisable to get “all the vaccines recommended by the Generalitat”. An editor provided statistical data that consolidated their explanations, including figures on the lives that vaccines save.

Vertex did not provide the data on the percentage of the population without vaccination and whether it is negatively affecting the public health of Catalonia. Not doing so can create the false alarm that the lack of vaccination is, right now, a problem. And if it is not a problem, perhaps it is that there is no need to give a voice to anti-vaxxers.

Vertex stumbled because it is journalistically weak. It lacks editorial criteria. It has good guests, but it is more concerned with the appearance of being informative than with editorial criteria. Despite everything, the anti-vaxxers did not come off well and science prevailed. Salvador Illa should not be alarmed and only needs to trust in the critical spirit of the viewers who watched the program.

What is perhaps more delicate is the blunt tweet by President Illa. To what extent is it appropriate for the President of the Generalitat to audit the editorial decisions of a news program? Acting as head of programming, he has created a precedent and now it will be necessary to establish when he will intervene and when he will remain silent regarding the future content, purposes, and blunders of TV3. From now on, even his silence will have an interpretation. On the other hand, a government that demands responsibility from public television will have to be excellent when it comes to guaranteeing its independence.