New Website Asks: “I Boost Immunity. Do you?”

I Boost Immunity, brought to you by the Public Health Association of BC’s (PHABC), is asking you to be an Immunization Booster and you can win swag for your efforts!

For many of us, an immunization booster is the extra dose of vaccine given to ‘boost’ protection against disease. For the Public Health Association of BC’s (PHABC) ‘I Boost Immunity’ platform, though, the term has
another meaning; Immunization Boosters are people that seek to raise ‘community immunity’ by using social media to share information about the benefits of immunization in exchange for points, badges and rewards.

It’s free and takes less than a minute to start.

Join the movement

• Share articles and stories through Facebook, Twitter and email all from one place.
• Take a picture with coworkers and hashtag it #IBoostImmunity on Instagram to have it appear
• Encourage your friends and family and coworkers to sign up as an Immunization Booster at http://www.iboostimmunity.ca on the IBoostImmunity website. Or email a picture to contact@iboostimmunity.ca
• Read engaging personal stories about how immunization has changed people’s lives.

This online program was inspired by declining immunization rates in some areas in BC and the concern that misinformation and complacency has resulted in some parents choosing to skip certain vaccines or
avoid immunizations all together. I Boost Immunity builds on lessons learned from previous approaches to immunization education by acknowledging the silent majority of people that do vaccinate their children.

I Boost Immunity is a website operated by the Public Health Association of BC in consultation with the provincial Immunization Promotions Working Group who both share the same goal: to improve the health of
British Columbians by continuing to reduce the number of infections by vaccine-preventable diseases, along with the illness, disability and death that they cause.

At its core, the program is based on the belief that educating others using stories combined with scientific facts can have a real and lasting impact among friends, families and co-workers. Ultimately, the goal
of I Boost Immunity is to raise awareness and action in areas that have lower than optimal immunization rates in British Columbia.

I Boost Immunity is a website owned and operated by PHABC in partnership with ImmunizeBC – a collaborative of the Ministry of Health, BC Centre for Disease Control, regional health authorities, First Nations and Inuit Health and the BC Pharmacy Association.

Photo (left to right): VCH nurses Tannis Weber, Dorothy Hamilton, Sue Coleman, Jamie Pringle, Lois Collier, and photobomber Anne Carten