Your covid numbers started going down and you took a well-deserved breath of relief that you made it through the pandemic. Even though vaccine rates were very low, ICU’s and hospitals overall were seeing things inch back towards normal till it hit with a new variant, DELTA!
Last week I received the sad news that an acquaintance of mine and his wife were both hospitalized with Covid. Neither one got a vaccine. He died yesterday on a ventilator.
Everyone has been touched in one way or another with Covid. There are many reasons the anti-vaccers state for not wanting a shot from a rush to production to a mistrust of the government to crazy theories of tracking chips being injected.
How does your health department convince people to step up and help themselves and the community?
A recent article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) highlighted that promoting one’s personal health trumped other reasons to get a vaccine. Other reasons in their study included getting vaccinated for social/ family reasons, economic reasons, and even patriotic reasons to help the country get back on its feet.
The New England Journal of Medicine in a July article stated that incentives are useful in situations where behavior changes can reduce future health expenditures. In the case of Covid-19 vaccination, the positive return on incentives may be considerable: in the United States alone, the cumulative financial costs of the pandemic are estimated at more than $16 trillion.
Do it for a prize…some of the ideas being used.
Last Friday the mayor of St Petersburg, Florida announced that those getting vaccinated can receive one month of free parking throughout the city.
Maryland and New York and Ohio are offering a dedicated lottery. New Jersey is offering dinner with the governor (although that may have changed).
Some are offering free fully funded college scholarships. Businesses are getting in on the incentive wave as well. From free doughnuts at Kripsy Kreme to free gun range usage, free joints at a marijuana store and more.
On a call with a health department administrator I consult with, I shared several of the incentive programs I have created for other agencies that boosted their Covid vaccine rates. To my surprise the usually opened minded client shared that he did not believe in offering incentives to people for public health. He felt it was a slippery slope to start that trend.
I told him that many CEO’s, presidents and small business owners would gladly write a check or hand out cash to get a new customer. Take a flooring store for example. If their average ticket was $2000, I think most would gladly pay someone $100 cash to come and buy their flooring (maybe even more).
I reminded him that until public health stops looking at each customer / patient as a one-time transaction and instead focuses on the lifetime value of a client, it will end up in the shadows and irrelevant as soon as this pandemic truly ends.
What can your health department do to incentivize and boost Covid vaccine rates? Send me an email and I will be happy to help you. rick@healthdepartmentmarketing.com