Manitoba takes another shot at campaign to promote COVID-19 vaccinations following criticism

Manitoba is taking a defunct vaccine advertising campaign and plugging it back in.

The province is reviving its Recharge Your Immunitypromotional spots beginning in early May, aspokesperson confirmed to CBC on Friday.

That move comes after the Progressive Conservative government facedcriticism for spending moreadvertising dollars recently topromoteits own budget than to improve lagging vaccine rates.

Manitobasurpassedthe national average forpeople who got their first two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine (89.7 per cent of those eligible), but uptake has trailed for additional doses. As of April 10, only 50.5 per cent of Manitobans aged 12 and up have received at least three doses.

The relaunched Recharge Your Immunity advertising campaign won't be as robust as the original version, which was mountedfrom January to February of this year.

The earlier campaignreceived play on billboards, digital displays, social media, print and radio.

The refreshed campaign, featuring the same battery imagery, will run for four weeks, but exclusively ondigital and social platforms, the government said.

The public relations push willtarget people aged 35 to 65, an age group whose uptake for third and fourth doses has lagged behind older Manitobans.

The government will spend $20,000 on the new campaign, which does not include organic social media posts it doesn't have to pay for, a spokesperson said. He said the province hasspent $1 million on paid vaccine advertising campaigns over the last year.

Over the past week, opposition parties have criticized the government for spending $245,000 to tout its latest budget, but nothing on a current vaccine advertising campaign.

Changing method to encourage vaccinations

On Friday morning, prior to the confirmation of the relaunched ad campaign,Premier Heather Stefansonwas asked if the province planneda new vaccination push.

She didn't provide anydetails at that point, but acknowledged the government's methods of promoting vaccination may start changing.

"In the past we've seen very, very aggressive campaigns," she told reporters Friday, after a news conference to announce the government'snew venture capital fund.

A new campaign "may lookmaybe something different than what we've seen in the past, but we will continue to make those efforts to ensure that we encourage as many Manitobans to get the booster as we can," she said.

Stefanson addedshe will continue to use every opportunity to encourage Manitobans to get shots beyond their first two.

Past provincial vaccination pushes included initiatives like a vaccination lottery, which offered a chance to win cash prizes or scholarships to people who got their shots.

The latest effortto encouragevaccinations comes as hospitals are stillstrained by the impact of COVID-19.

All hospitals in Winnipeg reported an increase in overall median wait times in March.

Officials cited multiple reasons for that, including the number ofpatients and the infectiousness of the virus increasing sickness levels among hospital staff to their highest mark in a decade, Shared Health and the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority said in a recent news release.

The province now only operates three mass vaccination sites, but people can get inoculated at manymedical clinics and pharmacies.