Your hamburger is more likely to kill you: Ad industry launches vaccination initiative

News 9 Aug 2021 - 2 min read

Your hamburger is more likely to kill you: Ad industry launches vaccination initiative

By Sam Buckingham-Jones - Senior Writer

“Our industry specialises in communication - so we’re calling on all agency leaders, clients, suppliers and colleagues to please help share information that puts the risk into perspective," Hardhat's Dan Monheit says.

Market Voice 3 min read

Retail media: Key lessons to avoid repeating programmatic ‘gold rush’ mistakes, hollowing out brand budgets

By Rory Heffernan - Chief Executive Officer, Atomic 212º | Partner Content

Retail media’s rise comes as marketers are being told to do even more with even less, says Atomic 212º Chief Executive Officer, Rory Heffernan, and puts brand budgets under further pressure.

Market Voice 4 min read

Airports are back bigger and better: why they are the next frontier for incredibly human brand connection

By Jemma Enright - General Manager, Airport, JCDecaux ANZ | Partner Content

In the next 5 years, brands will be reaching 85m passengers a year in the transformed terminals of Sydney, Adelaide, and Perth airports. That’s a massive opportunity to engage an emotionally charged audience in a context of curiosity and discovery, says JCDecaux’s Jemma Enright.

Market Voice 3 min read

The best relationships are personal – regional strategies should be too

By Phil Leyshon - Director of Digital, ACM | Partner Content

Mi3 sat down with ACM Director of Digital Phil Leyshon to discuss how first party data and enriched targeting is bringing brands closer to the regions – and notching upwards of 30 per cent growth.

Tags: vaccine Covid Dan Monheit Henry Innis Covid: One year on

A group of ad and media execs has launched a drive to encourage more people to get the AstraZeneca vaccine. @TheFactsination highlights the miniscule chance of dying at the hands of the vaccine when compared to other, more likely events.

What you need to know:

A group of ad and media execs has launched @TheFactsination, an initiative to share facts about the AstraZeneca vaccine's danger – or lack thereof.
The initiative is centred on an Instagram account that shows a way each letter of the alphabet can represent a more likely way to die than the vaccine.
X is for Christmas, which kills 42,325 people per year. J is for Jogging, which kills 1 in 23,000 people.

It's almost bizarre that a vaccine requires a rebrand. But a group of ad and media execs and agencies are attempting precisely that with a campaign to promote the AstraZeneca jab, “fight fear with facts”, and encourage all Australians who can to get vaccinated.

The @TheFactsination initiative centres around an Instagram account that shows the A to Z of ways people are more likely to die than from the AstraZeneca vaccine.

For example, the C in the alphabet stands for Constipation, which kills more than 2,100 people in America each year – more than the 1 in 1,000,000 attributed to the vaccine. Under the letter V, the chance of being killed by a volcano is 1 in 80,000, while the chance of dying while sleeping (under the letter Z) is, disconcertingly, 1 in 32.

Supporters of @TheFactsination initiative include Hardhat’s Dan Monheit, WPP’s Rose Herceg, Tribe’s Jules Lund, Mutiny’s Henry Innis, Brangwin & Moore Consulting’s Kieran Moore, Akcelo’s Aden Hepburn and The Savage Company’s Chris Savage.

"The risk of a fatal side effect from the AstraZeneca vaccine according to health experts is one in a million,” Monheit said.

“The risk of fatality resulting from typical daily activities such as taking a bath, having sex, or walking down the street, are far greater.”

Hepburn said the group was asking all agency and industry people to share the account and get the word out. In the meantime, they would be driving a publicity campaign targeting key journalists, radio and TV hosts, and influencers.