Vacines do not save lives. Vaccinations do.
This is an essential lesson we learned by working at the forefront of vaccine development and health communication. One of us (SP) helped develop vaccines for rubella, rabies and rotavirus, which have played an essential role in reducing preventable child deaths in the United States and around the world – but only because of public health campaigns that built confidence in vaccination and made vaccines easily accessible to people from all walks of life.
Now comes Covid-19, a highly infectious disease caused by a new coronavirus, SARS-CoV2, that humans have never encountered before. In an incredible feat of science and speed, we now have vaccines against this virus that are proving to be highly effective.
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Experts say 70% to 90% of Americans need to be vaccinated to end the pandemic. Even so, 44% of Americans plan to wait to receive the vaccine and 15% said they do not want to be vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2 in any way. This will not take us to the necessary level of immunity. We risk unnecessarily losing more lives to Covid-19, unless we launch massive campaigns to overcome vaccine hesitation and ensure that vaccines are accessible to everyone.
That’s why we need National Vaccine Day – a single federal holiday in 2021 to promote vaccine education, honor health professionals and scientists who have worked to help so many survive the pandemic and remember those who died from it. We are among a growing group of scientists and public health experts who want this holiday, including Dr. Richard Carmona, the 17th United States General Surgeon, and Angela Rasmussen, virologist at the Georgetown Center for Science and Security in Global Health.
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The holiday itself would be an innovative large-scale public health intervention that would focus the country’s attention on vaccination. The announcement of the holiday date, scheduled for as soon as it is safe – probably in the summer, but potentially later depending on the progress of vaccine launches – would serve as a light at the end of the tunnel, while creating a national benchmark for completing generalized and a day of opportunity for science education, social restoration and memory. This will encourage Americans to get vaccinated in advance so they can attend public events. This puts into practice research that shows that effective public health campaigns make promoted behaviors “easy, fun and popular”.
To be sure, National Vaccine Day should not be a premature celebration of a victory over Covid-19. Even if vaccination campaigns go well in the coming months, most of the developing world will not have access to vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 in 2021. And we need to be better prepared for the next pandemic, which could be caused by the flu or other new viruses reaching humans from birds, bats or other animals. Therefore, National Vaccine Day would also draw Americans’ attention to the global distribution of vaccines, as well as initiatives to prevent the next pandemic – including the development of more effective influenza vaccines.
National Vaccine Day would employ innovative health communication techniques, allowing communities in partnership with health institutions to combat the various forms of vaccine hesitation. New Orleans, for example, has already launched “Sleeves Up, NOLA!”, A campaign that uses the promise of social gatherings to encourage vaccination.
During the run-up to the holiday, a diverse group of scientists and community leaders – artists, coaches and athletes, religious leaders and others – would highlight the importance of vaccination with Covid-19 for all Americans. This campaign would help restore confidence in health institutions, showing how public health can be community-centered, proactive, engaging and cheerful. The promise of National Vaccine Day – a day of celebration and social restoration after months and months of social detachment – would encourage the country to get vaccinated in advance.
The holiday itself would involve teletons, radio programs and events on the Internet and social media to educate the public about vaccines and public health. A series of concerts and festivities would bring communities together and rejuvenate industries that suffered financially during the pandemic. National Vaccine Day would also be an opportunity to honor and express our deepest gratitude to health professionals and scientists who have worked tirelessly in the past year to protect us from the virus, often at significant personal risk. More than 1,700 health workers have died protecting us from this virus, and National Vaccine Day may involve a vigil for those we miss.
The US cannot fully celebrate while people around the world are dying from this vaccine-preventable disease. However, we can take stock, appreciate the progress of our nation, celebrate those we have lost and strive to make a better world with wider vaccination in the future. National Vaccine Day can also be used to raise funds for worldwide vaccination and to appeal to the best angels of our nature.
A single federal holiday to recognize and promote vaccination would help to spread the message that safe and effective vaccines save lives. It would be an action in the tradition of global vaccination campaigns that has allowed us to eliminate some of the most insidious infectious diseases in history.
President Biden could enact National Vaccine Day by executive order – and we and our colleagues encourage him to do so.
Stanley Plotkin is a vaccinologist, physician and emeritus professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania. Norman Baylor is president and chief executive officer of Biologics Consulting and former director of the Vaccine Research and Review Office of the Food and Drug Administration. Keona Wynne is a doctoral student at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. The authors serve on a steering committee for National Vaccine Day with 1Day Sooner, a non-profit vaccination organization.