Nicki Minaj is not alone. Vaccine misinformation is widespread.

The White House has offered to connect Nicki Minaj to one of the Biden’s administrations doctors to address her questions about the COVID-19 vaccine, after the rapper’s erroneous tweet alleging the vaccine causes impotence went viral.

Minaj recently made headlines after she said in a tweet to her more than 22.6 million followers that the Met Gala required attendees to be vaccinated, and that she wouldn’t get the shot until “I feel I’ve done enough research.”

Her initial remarks sounded reasonable enough. Everyone should do their own research on the vaccine.

But the Trinidadian-born star crossed the line when she later issued a tweet sharing an unverified story about a cousin’s friend in Trinidad. Minaj said that the unidentified man “became impotent’ and “his testicle became swollen” after receiving the shot.

The minister of health in Trinidad and Tobago, Terrence Deyalsingh, responded on Sept. 15 to Minaj’s claim.

“Unfortunately, it wasted so much time yesterday running down this false claim," Deyalsingh said. "As far as we know at this point in time there has been no such reported side effect or adverse event."

Deyalsingh added that there are no such side effects "anywhere in the world" that he and other health officials know of.

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Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, dismissed the claim as misinformation during an interview on CNN.

“There’s no evidence that it happens, nor is there any mechanistic reason to imagine that it would happen,” he said.

There are no reports of vaccines causing erectile dysfunction or the inflammation of the testicles, according to a researcher from the University of Miami who studied the effect of C0VID-19 vaccines on fertility.

In fact, COVID-19 infections may be a risk factor for impotence and male infertility, according to the researcher, Dr. Daniel Nassau.

Minaj is not alone in spreading misinformation.

Public health experts have had to struggled against misinformation from Republican lawmakers, celebrities and other public figures to counteract resistance to getting the shot, particularly among younger and more conservative demographics.

There has been widespread false or misleading information about the safety and efficacy of the vaccines, a major factor in vaccine hesitancy.

The Center for Countering Digital Hate, a nonprofit that studies extremism, has studies that linked a dozen accounts to spreading the majority of vaccine disinformation on Facebook.

The Biden administration will need a more aggressive public relations campaign to counter disinformation about the vaccine’s safety and effectiveness including encouraging more pop stars to show public support for the vaccine. Public health officials need to ramp up efforts to refute disinformation to reach vaccine skeptics, particularly young adults.

Irv Randolph is an award-winning journalist. You can follow him on Twitter @IrvRandolph and at the RandolphReport@substack.com