(PHILADELPHIA, PA) – Leaders in the local Black and Caribbean communities have come together to create and champion a public health-awareness campaign promoting the benefits of getting vaccinated against COVID-19 and its variants.

The initiative, Your Health Matters, Arm Yourself…Vaccinate!, kicked off recently, with a series of advertisements on SEPTA in Philadelphia – from Center City to City Line Avenue -- and its surrounding counties.

The focus is on the region’s high-risk underserved communities, which are vulnerable to higher infection rates during the COVID-19 crisis. A contingent of professionals from medicine, business, government, and the community implemented a collaborative grassroots strategy to actively address the wide disparity in healthcare inequities that existed before, and now are prevalent during the pandemic. 

The message is simple and straightforward with a “we’re-in-this-together” tone: COVID-19 and related variants are preventable, or minimized, through vaccination and booster intervention. Protect yourself and others. It is not too late to vaccinate.

An ad campaign on public transit – various SEPTA buses -- will run through June, and is now critical, as local and national health officials are predicting a bout with another highly contagious variant on the horizon. The ads are accompanied by the #SPOTTHEBUS Challenge, a social-media engagement contest. The public can win restaurant certificates and other amazing must-have prizes. Just take a photo of the ads on the “Spot the FunTimes COVID-19 Vaccine” buses, and then tag FunTimes on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Join the conversation at: 

The goal is to achieve the highest vaccination and booster rates possible in communities of color through the assistance of educational marketing outreach to neighborhood schools, businesses, churches, and community groups. The COVID-19 public-service messages align with the mission of participating organizations led by FunTimes Magazine, a trusted information source and coalition-builder serving and mobilizing underserved Diaspora communities in the Mid-Atlantic states. 

It is important to directly engage with highly impacted Diaspora communities on the COVID-19 and variant vaccination issue -- which reflects overall longstanding race inequities of access and the administration of health services.

Employing a continuum of social media as well as advertising and news stories, the project was established to combat the disproportionate levels of coronavirus cases in susceptible African, African-American, and Caribbean communities. 

With the impending return of stricter pandemic protocols in the Delaware Valley, the campaign is a gentle reminder to those who are unvaccinated or not fully vaccinated that the virus is still a serious threat and to make a date to get their shots for future protection against new sub-variants including the now-dominant BA.2. 

To “get on board” with the COVID-19 health protections, advertising has been directed to omnipresent SEPTA reaching high-risk populations including those in the inner city – of Philadelphia and the suburbs in parts of Montgomery, Delaware, and Bucks counties. The spots in Philadelphia can be viewed on transit routes citywide including in Center City, Southwest, and West Philly (University City). About 660,700 riders will see the ads on routes that cover 1,616 transports daily.