By working with the people who know their communities best, the Equity First Vaccination Initiative showed how we can continue to remove barriers and improve equity-centered public health.

The 20 evidence-based recommendations from The Rockefeller Foundation’s Equity Advisory Council serve as a roadmap to integrate vaccine and health equity into public health.

By adopting an equity-first approach and working with the people who know their communities best, we can increase vaccine access and improve the health of millions of people of color.

The Equity-First Vaccination Initiative comprised a variety of partners with individually defined but mutually reinforcing roles. These partners included:

Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) in the demonstration sites, which were the central focus of the EVI. There were nearly 100 organizations on the ground that worked to implement hyperlocal strategies to increase equitable access to information and vaccinations, including identifying trusted messengers (and, in many cases, serving as the trusted messengers themselves.)

Anchor partners and other key partners, who played core roles in coordinating efforts among CBOs within their communities. The partners provided leadership, tracked progress, fostered communities of practice, and worked with CBOs to ensure that they had what they needed to be successful.

Read the full article about vaccine equity at The Rockefeller Foundation.