Family Guy’s Stewie Griffin tells people to get vaccinated

A public service announcement using characters from the show explains the benefits of vaccinations

Seth MacFarlane and the Family Guy team have created a public service announcement encouraging the public to get vaccinated.

Written by series creator, MacFarlane, the three-minute video shows Peter Griffin expressing doubts over the vaccine, so Stewie and Brian Griffin explain the benefits of vaccination.

Combining surrealist Family Guy humour with scientific accuracy, Brian and Stewie shrink down to the size of a microorganism and simulate the effects of the vaccine.

“Vaccines protect us from illnesses by activating our immune response without the danger of actual infection, thereby training the body to fight off the real thing. Some of the Covid vaccines work by exposing your immune system to proteins, which resemble the spike proteins of the virus but cannot infect you,” Stewie tells Peter.

After listening to Brian and Stewie explain how getting the vaccine lessens the severity of infection and protects people around them from the virus, Peter willingly get the jab.

The short clip also explains how vaccines have been used to eradicate smallpox and significantly reduce the threat of polio.

Family Guy executive producers Rich Appel and Alec Sulkin commented on the decision to make the video in a statement: “We were proud to work with some of the nation’s leading immunologists and epidemiologists on this PSA. And while we never understood a single note they gave us, we took them all.”

MacFarlane also frequently uses his Twitter account, which has nearly 14 million followers, to emphasise the importance of vaccines and that everybody should get vaccinated.