Qualitative research or text mining of social media to determine why patients feel vaccination runs counter to their identity.
Create targeted messaging based on relevant barriers, such as a “Go out with a bang, but don’t die this death” campaign for groups with a Covid-defiant identity.
Find a common enemy
Message testing to determine what common enemies resonate across two polarized groups. Look for an enemy that prompts more animosity than the opposite group does.
If a common enemy is poverty or recession: “This economy needs a shot in the arm. We can do that.”
If a common enemy is those who don’t believe in America: “Think we can’t vaccinate 300 million people in 3 months? Watch us.”
Use analogy
Develop a list of appropriate analogies for critical facts, processes, or statistics and share them through health care channels. Encourage trusted medical providers to prepare their own analogies for common vaccine questions. Use analogies to augment more complicated discussions of fact.
Use process analogies (e.g., if asked how the vaccine works, say “mRNA is like a teacher that shows the body how to make the antibodies that fight off Covid.”)
Use statistical analogies (e.g., “You’d be more likely to get hit by lightning than to die from Covid after getting vaccinated.”)
Increase observability
Make it easy to see, in person or online, who has been vaccinated.
Offer a wearable token — a bracelet, sticker, or pin — that can be observed by others.
Offer social media frames and banners (e.g., “I’m a First Responder and I’m Vaccinated”).
Partner with celebrities, respected local leaders, and members of all parties to show them, on old and new media, being vaccinated.
Leverage natural scarcity
Use a national or state referendum to decide who gains access to the vaccine first, or request community input through surveys.
Frame the chosen “first receivers” — whether the elderly, first responders, teachers, or essential workers — as nationally valued and honored.
Predict and address negative attributions
Monitor media to quickly identify negative attributions. For segment-specific attributions, partner with community leaders or influencers to identify and counter negative attributions.
If delays in vaccine accessibility are being attributed to government incompetence, use daily briefings to show a complicated “air traffic control map” tracking freezer trucks.
If prioritized deployment of vaccines in historically disadvantaged neighborhoods is being attributed to a belief that these populations are expendable “lab rats,” include these communities’ trusted local leaders in prioritization discussions.
Prompt anticipated regret
Develop and use communications to remind people of a low-probability but high-stakes outcomes and the resulting strong emotions.
Train family practice staff to use questions and statements such as:
“What would change in your family if you became a Covid long-hauler and had permanent lung or heart damage?”
“I’ve seen the crushing guilt of families that lose someone to Covid after not being quite careful enough — don’t do that to yourself.”
Avoid conveying piecemeal risk information
Coordinate press releases with stakeholders to avoid letting bad news trickle out and making it seem worse than it is.
If a delay seems likely, wait until you have a clear sense of the new situation and present any bad news up front and, ideally, just once.
Promote compromise options
Find ways to promote a sense of control by offering multiple vaccination choices; introduce other actions to frame vaccination as a middle or normal choice.
Train cold-call promoters or survey takers to ask people if they will get the vaccine later, get it now, or get it now and sign up to donate plasma.
Create FOMO motivations
Frame vaccination as a desirable opportunity not to be missed. Find and provide rewards for vaccine completion.
Partner with employers to give employees a day off to be vaccinated.
Create a campaign to promote the idea that families should stagger vaccinations so that each “hero” gets a day in bed with snacks and binge-watching movies.
Use monetary incentives (tax deductions or insurance refunds).
Encourage celebrities to hold future free events for vaccinated fans.
Combat uniqueness neglect
Work with health care providers to identify patient groups that might feel they have special conditions unlike “ordinary” people.
Train medical personal to identify uniqueness neglect (e.g., patients might say, “The vaccine is fine, but it won’t work for me.”)
Offer safe (even if largely unnecessary) modifications to standard vaccine delivery (e.g., topical analgesics before injection; getting the shot late in the day).
Neutralize the case versus base-rate heuristic
Communicate with clinicians and other front-line health personnel about the base-rate fallacy. Build and use collection of positive anecdotes.
Encourage clinicians to counter patients’ anecdotal “bad reaction” stories with “good reaction” stories rather than statistics.
Ensure that DHHS briefings and websites include a continuous collection of real people’s stories about good vaccination experiences.
OTTAWA – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the NDP is caving to political pressure from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre when it comes to their stance on the consumer carbon price.
Trudeau says he believes Jagmeet Singh and the NDP care about the environment, but it’s “increasingly obvious” that they have “no idea” what to do about climate change.
On Thursday, Singh said the NDP is working on a plan that wouldn’t put the burden of fighting climate change on the backs of workers, but wouldn’t say if that plan would include a consumer carbon price.
Singh’s noncommittal position comes as the NDP tries to frame itself as a credible alternative to the Conservatives in the next federal election.
Poilievre responded to that by releasing a video, pointing out that the NDP has voted time and again in favour of the Liberals’ carbon price.
British Columbia Premier David Eby also changed his tune on Thursday, promising that a re-elected NDP government would scrap the long-standing carbon tax and shift the burden to “big polluters,” if the federal government dropped its requirements.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
Simon Jolin-Barrette, minister responsible for consumer protection, has tabled a bill to force merchants to calculate tips based on the price before tax.
That means on a restaurant bill of $100, suggested tips would be calculated based on $100, not on $114.98 after provincial and federal sales taxes are added.
The bill would also increase the rebate offered to consumers when the price of an item at the cash register is higher than the shelf price, to $15 from $10.
And it would force grocery stores offering a discounted price for several items to clearly list the unit price as well.
Businesses would also have to indicate whether taxes will be added to the price of food products.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
Quebec legislature member Youri Chassin has announced he’s leaving the Coalition Avenir Québec government to sit as an Independent.
He announced the decision shortly after writing an open letter criticizing Premier François Legault’s government for abandoning its principles of smaller government.
In the letter published in Le Journal de Montréal and Le Journal de Québec, Chassin accused the party of falling back on what he called the old formula of throwing money at problems instead of looking to do things differently.
Chassin says public services are more fragile than ever, despite rising spending that pushed the province to a record $11-billion deficit projected in the last budget.
He is the second CAQ member to leave the party in a little more than one week, after economy and energy minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced Sept. 4 he would leave because he lost motivation to do his job.
Chassin says he has no intention of joining another party and will instead sit as an Independent until the end of his term.
He has represented the Saint-Jérôme riding since the CAQ rose to power in 2018, but has not served in cabinet.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
