Read on Twitter
COVID-19 Messaging: What Have We Learned from Vermont?
Our team has been documenting VT’s #covid-19 messaging as part of our ongoing qualitative research on COVID-19 and rural health equity in rural NNE (NH/VT). Here are 10 strengths that we’ve seen in the state’s approach.
Our team has been documenting VT’s #covid-19 messaging as part of our ongoing qualitative research on COVID-19 and rural health equity in rural NNE (NH/VT). Here are 10 strengths that we’ve seen in the state’s approach.
1/ Empower the Population: Vermont leaders convey a dual sense of hope and agency in responding to the pandemic. Communities hear that they can curb transmission & avoid resurgences through their actions. https://twitter.com/GovPhilScott/status/1313498533727735814?s=20
2/ Describe Public Health Measures as Tools to Achieve Local Goals and Priorities: Vermont has framed public health measures as tools to achieve locally meaningful goals, including reopening schools and protecting ailing businesses. https://twitter.com/GovPhilScott/status/1306973909556830218?s=20
3/ Rely on Existing Tools: VT leaders emphasize existing public health measures and tools over those that may become available in the future. This underscores that the pandemic can be managed within available resource constraints.
4/ Describe and Present Choices with Transparency: VT’s leadership has framed decisions to limit certain activities as choices between competing priorities. This has helped to minimize the perception of restrictions as arbitrary or punitive.
5/ Craft Messages Rooted in Empathy and Solidarity: Messaging consistently recognizes the social, economic, and psychological impacts of the pandemic on the lives of Vermonters and expresses appreciation for their ongoing sacrifices. https://twitter.com/GovPhilScott/status/1328736596305334274?s=20
6/ Reject Shame and Stigmatization: Messaging has explicitly and consistently has called upon Vermonters to reject shame and stigmatization. https://twitter.com/healthvermont/status/1336002548071854084?s=20
7/ Communicate with transparency: Vermont’s leadership has communicated what can and cannot be achieved with the available tools.
8/ Make Data Meaningful to Action: VT leadership has situated state date within regional/national epidemiology to counter low perception of threat/overconfidence in progress amid low or falling case counts. https://twitter.com/JaneLindholm/status/1336344524579364866?s=20
9/ Communicate with Specificity: VT leaders have increasingly named very specific activities contributing to #covid19 transmission based on local contact tracing data (carpooling, birthday parties, coffee breaks) to illustrate areas of concern. https://twitter.com/healthvermont/status/1327362966610735113?s=20
10/ Norm positive action: VT leaders have sought to norm positive action rather than elevate noncompliance or anti-science ideas. This contributes to the impression that most are following state guidance.
Effective messaging has been a critical component of VT’s success in managing the pandemic; however, I want to emphasize that it has been used to communicate, rather than substitute for, a robust state-led public health response.
Some messaging approaches from VT may translate to other settings; however, others may be less relevant. A combination of methods, including community-based, qualitative research and digital ethnography, can help to inform messaging strategies and approaches.
