The Government is planning to ramp up promotion of the coronavirus vaccine amid rising concerns over the spread of anti-vaxxer conspiracy theories.

With the jab expected to be approved this week and a possible rollout within days, health ministers are said to be in talks with high profile stars to promote positive messages about it.

Environment secretary George Eustice told Sky News this morning: ‘This is something I know the Department of Health are looking at in a wider campaign basically to ensure that we get uptake of the vaccine.

‘It will be crucial that once we perfect this vaccine and are able to roll it out that we get uptake, particularly amongst some of those older age groups who are obviously at greatest risk.

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‘They will be looking at a wide range of interventions.

‘It’s important we get the communications around this right. There has been some scaremongering out there around vaccinations and conspiracy theories and so forth.

‘It’s going to be very important that we give people the confidence to embrace this vaccination.’

He wouldn’t confirm which celebrities had been asked, but he said it wouldn’t be politicians.

Sources have suggested Marcus Rashford, the England footballer campaigning to end child hunger, and members of the Royal Family could be involved.

Well-known TV doctors and Instagram influencers are also thought to be targets to help get the country behind the vaccine.

Religious and community leaders are also being consulted in order to alleviate fears over the vaccine among black, Asian and ethnic minority groups.

The Government refused to provide details but a source said officials are working closely with Public Health England and NHS England and Improvement ‘to provide authoritative information to the public’.

It comes after recent survey in the US and UK found that public willingness to take a Covid-19 jab fell by 6.4% after reading anti-vaccination posts on social media.

Researchers also recently found in the UK confidence in vaccine safety rose from 47% in May 2018 to around 52% in November 2019 – but said doubt is growing in Europe.

They described the decrease in confidence as a ‘worrying trend’, and cited the spread of misinformation about vaccines as a problem.

The Army has already mobilised an ‘information warfare’ unit to fight anti-vaxxer propaganda, according to the Sunday Times.

Soldiers from the defence cultural specialist unit, launched in Afghanistan in 2010, are analysing how Britons are being targeted online.

The troops, who belong to the 77th Brigade, are sizing up the level of vaccine-related disinformation from hostile states such as Russia, according to The Sunday Times.

The Government officially handed over the Oxford University and AstraZeneca jab to regulators for safety checking last week – meaning the vaccine could potentially be given a green light for rollout any day now.

This could make the UK the first country in the world to approve a coronavirus vaccine.

But it was also revealed hackers from North Korea are suspected of trying to break into AstraZeneca’s systems in recent weeks.

Foreign secretary Dominic Raab said the mass rollout of Covid-19 vaccine will transform the UK into a ‘whole new world’ by the spring.

‘The vaccine will [by then] have been distributed to key workers and the most vulnerable, particularly by age,’ he said.

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