Category: Take Action

Alliance for Health Policy Event: COVID-19 Vaccine Deployment 

As we continue to see news outlets infiltrated with concerns and progress regarding a COVID-19 vaccine, the lack of transparency about access becomes more prominent. If you are interested in gaining more insight into vaccine accessibility and potential schemes for vaccine deployment, the Alliance for Health Policy is holding an event on September 30th, 2020. Panelists will be discussing the manufacturing, distribution, delivery, and coverage techniques that would allow for the United States to have nationwide COVID-19 vaccine access. For those interested in attending, more information and a registration link can be found here. 

The event features four members: Richard Hughes, Esther Krofah, Nicolette Louissaint, and Reed Tuckson. Hughes is the Managing Director and Vaccines and Preventive Services Leader at Avalere Health; Krofah is the Executive Director of FasterCures; Louissaint is the Executive Director of Healthcare Ready, and Reed Tuckson is the Managing Director for Tuckson is the Board Chair for the Alliance for Health Policy. 

Season 2 Week 2 Podcast for Free the Vaccine for COVID-19

For those who are unaware, the Free the Vaccine for COVID-19 Campaign recently launched a weekly News Podcast to update you on what’s happening in the world of the vaccine. You can access the latest episode for Free the Vaccine for COVID-19 week 2 here! (We’ll have an official podcast feed up soon.)

If you read this newsletter, we have two things to say. One, we love you! And two, we want to know what you love.

Has a particular Free The Vaccine action inspired you? Do you wake up every Friday excited for the Special Bonus Content in this newsletter? Would you like to see a deeper dive into vaccine-related news, or into our participants’ crafting process? Do you think we should be taking to the streets—like we did in our London Carnival March—more often?

We want to hear from you, and you can email us at info@freethevaccine.org!

July 28th through July 30th, the University of California will be holding the next meeting of its Board of Regents, and anyone who signs up by 9 AM PST on Monday, July 27th, will have the opportunity to make their voice heard. You do not need to be a California resident or a member of the UC community in order to make a public comment.

Free The Vaccine activists have put together this handy guide on how to sign up to speak, including talking points you can use. You will have 1-3 minutes to speak, depending on demand; please sign up even to make a brief statement in support of the University of California signing the Open COVID Pledge.

We don’t need fancy public speaking skills, but we do need numbers to ensure that the Regents hear the words “Open COVID Pledge” as many times as possible before the meeting is over. We have the power to redirect the conversation. Sign up and help us do it!

If you didn’t know by now, individual supporters can sign on to the Open COVID Pledge on our website, with a form that takes only a minute or two to fill out! If you haven’t added your name yet, take a minute to do so now. If you’ve already added your name, try to get a few of your friends to do the same!

Feeling nervous about asking a few friends? Free The Vaccine project manager Victoria El-Hayek has gathered 75 signatures from people she knows. Here’s what she has to say:

A lot of people, especially in America, don’t realize that access to a COVID vaccine won’t be a guarantee. Because of this, increasing awareness of FTV is so important as this campaign is for every single person in this world. Sharing the individual sign on for the pledge is a great (and easy) way to help people understand the necessity of this campaign. There are so many ways to share this pledge. You can post it all over social media (Facebook groups are great for this) or send it in emails but what I’ve found is the best way to get people to sign on is by texting them and explaining why this is important for everyone, but also why you care about this campaign so much and ask them to sign on and share it with others! 99% if people will be more than willing to sign on knowing how important it is to you. People in your life, even if you haven’t talked in awhile, are more willing to help you out than you might realize so don’t be afraid to ask!

Join Us in London!
Monday 27th 12-3

Universities receive billions in public funding for their research on Covid-19 vaccines, diagnostics, tracking tools and treatments. We’re asking them to sign the Open Covid Pledge, to stop drug companies profiteering with publicly funded research.  

Join our Action: A (socially distanced) costumed walk to 3 universities in London – Kings College, LSE and UCL. All receive COVID-19 research funding, and have not yet guaranteed how they will support a People’s Vaccine.

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JOIN US!

• Wear / make a costume and march (Covid Head Masks / Lab Coats)
• March with a banner / placard  (some slogan ideas below)
• Join the Social Media team

MEET POINT

King’s College, Guy’s Campus
(by covered statue of Thomas Guy, Great Maze Pond, SE1)
11am Monday 27th July.

All Participants Must Wear a Mask and Keep a Covid Distance  

MORE DETAILS: Join this online planning meeting to discuss roles, costumes and social media Saturday 18 July @ 5

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Placard / Banner Slogans
(feel free to make your own!)

This Friday, July 17th, join a social media push led by the Bear Squad!

All you have to do is post this Bingo template to your Instagram story, inviting your friends to sign on to the Open COVID Pledge.

As more friends sign on, you can repost the image, tagging them to thank them for signing!

Here’s an example timeline the Bear Squad shared to explain how it works:

1. Sharing the template with a caption on how it works. You can link the pledge under your bio for easy access.

2. Tagging your friends who have signed the pledge! You can wait for 3 signatures before reposting the template with their usernames, then save the story to be reposted after more signatures.

3. Our planned outcome!

Several weeks ago, our participants decided to make a Free The Vaccine video inspired by “Jolene” after learning that Vanderbilt University had received $10 million from the US government for COVID-19 vaccine research, in addition to $1 million from country singer Dolly Parton. Today, we launched our initial music video, and at the time I write this, our video has been viewed over 238,000 times (and counting).

Now we’re asking you to join us, following the instructions here to make your own video lip-syncing to our “Jolene” parody so you can be included in a future video! We’re also asking you to share the video far and wide (you can find the YouTube link here), and tag Vanderbilt in any social media posts you make about it. Let’s make art together that lifts our spirits and builds power at the same time. We’ll keep you updated as this exciting campaign continues to develop!

Got three minutes to help our team?

One of our Seal squads, based in Europe, had the idea to create a “Goodnight Stories for Rebel Scientists” book to celebrate COVID-19 researchers and advocate for the Open COVID Pledge at the same time! They’ve completed a beautiful portrait and profile for a scientist named Hanneke Schuitemaker, and now they need your help getting her attention.

With just a few minutes of your time, you can help our team. Here’s a sample tweet to get you started:

@SchuitemakerH We’re writing a profile of you to enter in the book Goodnight Stories for Rebel Scientists because of your work to make a COVID vaccine. But we need your help to finish the story! Please DM @fullyfiona to start a convo on how we can work together to #FreeTheVaccine

Want to make your tweet stand out even more? Add some images from the upcoming book!