Winner
#thinkhepatitis
Summary of work
In 2014 the World Health Organization (WHO) and World Hepatitis Alliance wanted to reach more people and educate them with lifesaving information about viral hepatitis - the world’s seventh biggest killer. They also wanted to drive the initiation of national hepatitis strategies.
This kick-started our campaign, Hepatitis: Think Again, which encouraged people to challenge perceptions about hepatitis, long stigmatised as a disease caught from dirty needles or tainted blood. Our goal: change minds, spur action — confront stigmas head-on.
We launched our campaign at the 53-nation Commonwealth Games - where we built the world’s largest Tweet Wall for the public to help quash hepatitis myths. A Thunderclap campaign reached 14.5 million people through digital influencers such as WHO, UNICEF, The Guardian, Stephen Fry, Jack Whitehall and Dr Christian Jessen. We made our message sing-able and our puppet band video went viral on YouTube, reaching 750,000. We also sent 6.5 million SMS text messages across Sub Saharan Africa to educate hard-to-reach audiences.
In total, 157 countries and 87 governments joined our campaign, among them Barack Obama and David Cameron. It was the most engaged World Hepatitis Day to date, reaching 148 million people via Twitter using the hashtag #thinkhepatitis
Judges’ comments
Amazing results with a limited budget, this looks great and clearly resonates with its stakeholders. It has had some great results and got really heavy hitters behind it. The work created a publicity storm around this issue by creating a lot of noise and engagement in a very cost-effective way.
