World Meningitis Day 2020
Member Activities
CoMO members from our three regions, Europe Africa, Americas and Asia Pacific, did lots of awareness-raising activities this year. Here is a snippet of what they got up to!
The Philippine Foundation for Vaccination worked with Vaccine Study Group, UP National Institute of Health, Medical Societies, Industry partners and Civic Organizations to organise a webinar on World Meningitis Day. They discussed updates on Global Meningococcal Initiative, led by Prof. Josefina Carlos. There were great experience sharing from the audience moderated by Prof. Lulu Bravo, and she reiterated that we should join hands in defeating meningitis. There were over 100 attendees!
The Meningitis B Action Project released educational social media infographics and mobilised their network of advocates and partners across 50 states for a digital campaign focused on not forgetting the MenB vaccine during COVID-19.
On World Meningitis Day, Christine Bennborn appeared on the prime-time breakfast show on national television in Sweden. Christine told her personal story, of how her son Mathias died from meningitis in 2019. The response she received was phenomenal, and many people contacted her to tell her their experience with meningitis.
Kathryn Blain, the Founder and Executive Director of Meningitis Research Foundation of Canada, appeared on Breakfast Television Toronto. Kathryn told her story, of how her song Michael died from meningitis aged 19.
The Meningitis Research Foundation launched a social media campaign to get people to pledge their support for the Global Roadmap to Defeat Meningitis by 2030. The pledges are shown on a world map, which visually presents the global support for the Roadmap. Over 800 people signed the pledge so far! Sign the pledge here.
JaCMO launched a social media campaign, including two videos. One focused on the awareness-raising resources produced by CoMO, and the other video was from JaCMO's medical advisor, giving key information about meningitis.
The JAMIE Group launched a social media campaign and Jamie Schanbaum appeared in an article in The Statesman on World Meningitis Day.
AEM ran a World Meningitis Day art competition for children. They shared the creations on their social media pages and awarded a certificate to the winner. Also, AEM Ambassador David Bartolo Morana led a workout session! As well as these activities, AEM produced a series of videos asking: 'Can you imagine a world without meningitis?'
For World Meningitis Day, The Meningitis Centre Australia released a series of animations to raise awareness of meningitis, methods of prevention and vaccines in a child-friendly way.
The Meningitis Foundation Aotearoa New Zealand conducted an online campaign with a series of information tiles posted accross their social media channels. They also worked with GSK on a local media outreach campaign to ensure there was increased awareness of meningitis as New Zealand heads into the winter months.
