It was a screenshot of a 75-slide presentation posted on the US Food and Drug Administration website, which was shared with her by a friend who attended a recent meeting on emergency vaccine clearance.
The image showed a thin black line, surrounded by a strong gray shading rising towards the top of the graph.
None of that sounds so funny. The image, however, visibly looked like an anatomical part that cannot be repeated in a family newspaper. This did not go unnoticed by Marcus, or by the hundreds of comments with double meaning.
“The J&J vaccine is coming up for the occasion”, Marcus wrote with a wink. Who said that epidemiologists have no sense of humor?
Within hours, the post was shared more than 6,000 times and received more than 30,000 “likes”. Hundreds of people began to weigh in and make their own carefree comments about what, exactly, the image looked like. You can read all the answers on here (be warned, many are NSFW).
Reached by phone, Marcus said that since everyone has been talking about COVID-19 and vaccines for months and the news has been relentlessly gloomy, she wanted to brighten people’s spirits.
“People are struggling now and I think they need to laugh. That was really my only intention, ”she said. “I think people love a good pun.”
But the answer, she said, was a little surprising.
“I didn’t really anticipate that,” said Marcus. “I really can’t keep up with the response. But it looks like a pun party. “
Your tweet had an unexpected benefit that many commentators have noted. By using an obscene joke to convey important information about the effectiveness of the latest vaccine, you can increase people’s confidence in getting the shot.
“You laugh,” one person tweeted, “but I argue that this chart will reach more people who need to see it than a chart that doesn’t look like that!”
Another person said it was a smart way to promote the vaccine, while a third party applauded the use of humor at the a public health message.
Marcus’ research focuses mainly on HIV. But during the pandemic, she wrote about the “importance of a harm reduction approach to preventing coronavirus transmission, with lessons learned from the HIV epidemic,” according to the Harvard Medical School website.
Marcus said her tweet was just to bring a bit of levity to a dark time. But if the chart helps to spread information about how to get vaccinated and draws attention to “very impressive data,” it is a win-win situation, she said.
“The more people see the incredible data on the effectiveness of these vaccines, the better,” she said, “and I’m happy to do my little bit.”
It is not what little.
Steve Annear is after stories so strange or unconventional that you will want to bring them up at dinner parties. Did you see something you would like answers to? A giant door? Or maybe one rocking horse graveyard, a stranger stone marker on an island, or old trophies under a bridge? Let us know by contacting us.
Steve Annear can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @steveannear.