The Danish Medicines Agency's adverse reaction database contains data on suspected adverse reactions reported in Denmark for specific types of medicines. This information supports post-marketing safety monitoring programmes. Currently, thousands of reports are submitted to the database annually, making it a significant repository of drug safety information. However, a commonly cited limitation of pharmacovigilance is the assumption that "stimulated reporting" of adverse events occurs in response to warnings, alerts, and label changes issued by health authorities.
In vaccine research literature, the concept of "stimulated reporting" is based on the idea that adverse event reporting may self-oscillate when vaccine recipients are influenced by widespread vaccine risk communication in the media. It suggests that adverse event reporting reflects sensory, conscious, and communicative phenomena tied to the rise of digital health communication and surveillance technologies, which empower citizens to take care of themselves and others.
By comparing communication environments surrounding the implementation of various vaccination programmes in Denmark, this project seeks to identify and explore self-oscillatory effects in pharmacovigilance. The goal is to understand how these effects signal the emergence of a new form of digital health citizenship shaped by early 21st-century vaccine policies.
