Top Hybrid Influences of the Week in Ukraine

This Friday our #HybridWeekly rubric includes:

  • When the Chief Public Health Officer Viktor Lyashko got infected with COVID-19 after the first stage of vaccination, pro-Kremlin media exploited the idea that the latter caused the former. According to the analysis of clinical research data, after a single standard dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, its effectiveness is 76% – from day 22 to day 90. In fact, it was only the 13th day after the vaccination when Lyashko contracted the virus: the immunity had not yet been fully formed.
  • The pro-Russian “Opposition Platform – For Life” party continues to exploit the issue of high utility tariffs – a pressure point for their audience. By giving populistic promises of reducing the tariff burden for Ukrainians, the party’s goal is to raise their support and force the need to be “friends” with Russia.
  • As Ukraine is about to go into another lockdown due to the third wave of COVID-19, the Kremlin agents are quick to interpret this measure as an attempt to draw the public’s attention from “repressions” against pro-Kremlin actors, mainly the sanctions against Medvedchuk, Putin’s closest ally and a media oligarch, and his wife.