Facebook Inc will start banning all ads that explicitly discourage people from getting vaccinated, the world’s largest social media company has announced.

Its current rules prohibit ads containing vaccine misinformation or hoaxes identified by leading health organisations, but allows ads opposing vaccines if they do not contain false claims.

“Today, we’re launching a new global policy that prohibits ads discouraging people from getting vaccinated. We don’t want these ads on our platform,” said the company’s head of health Kang-Xing Jin and director of product management Rob Leathern in a blog post.

“Now, if an ad explicitly discourages someone from getting a vaccine, we’ll reject it.”