Alliance for Advancing Health Online’s Vaccine Confidence Fund

Alliance for Advancing Health Online’s Vaccine Confidence Fund

About

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused global devastation with the deaths of over 6.25 million people, disrupting economic and social prosperity with a disproportionate impact on historically excluded or marginalized communities globally. It has also significantly changed our daily lives in all aspects – from the way we live, work, and engage with key public information, including through the use of social media and online platforms.

Now, over a year after the first COVID-19 vaccines were introduced, while nearly 60% of the global population has been fully vaccinated, the relationship between vaccines and the public has changed. Amidst COVID-19 fatigue and complacency, we have seen:

- A shift from hesitancy driven by safety and efficacy concerns to hesitancy driven by a desire for individual freedom and rights1

- An assumption that breakthrough infections caused by newer COVID-19 strains may mean that available vaccines are not working

- That local environment and community are influential in an individual’s desire to be vaccinated

- That the COVID-19 epidemic has influenced willingness to vaccinate generally. For example, in a 15-country COVID-19 Perception study conducted by the Africa CDC, 1-in-6 people declared that they are now less likely to vaccinate than before the outbreak.2

This illustrates that there are still significant headwinds that must be explored and mitigated to promote vaccination confidence — for COVID-19 and routine immunizations — and drive uptake around the world.

The Alliance for Advancing Health Online is bringing collaborators from the technology, health, global development, and academic sectors together to advance public understanding of how social media can best be utilized to better understand and increase the health and resiliency of communities around the world.

The Alliance launched its first program of research in June 2021- the Vaccine Confidence Fund (“the Fund”), which funded 33 research projects. To respond to the quickly evolving landscape, persistent unmet needs, insights and lessons learned via the first round of research, the Alliance is now launching a second round of funding to explore how social media can be leveraged to increase vaccination confidence and uptake for COVID-19 and routine immunizations.

The Fund is managed by Global Impact and financially supported by Meta Platforms, Inc. ("Meta") and Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA (known as MSD outside the United States and Canada) ("MSD"). Meta and MSD will not participate in the selection of fund recipients.

Expectations of Grantees

- Participate in regular calls with Fund Manager.

- Submit a mid-term progress report and final report via a grant management platform. Reporting will be lightweight but meaningful and focus on reviewing anticipated versus actual outcomes, metrics, and milestones as submitted in the approved proposal. Reporting will include relevant charts, images, or captions that can be used to tell a narrative around the impact of their work and for dissemination purposes.

- Attend 1-2 virtual meetings and phone calls to provide status updates on research progress. Specific dates for reviews will be communicated at the time of award and based on the proposed research plan’s timeline.

- Contribute standardized summarized findings, imagery, and other information to the Fund Manager in support of the compilation of a final “Insights Report.”

- Drive dissemination of results/findings e.g., through publication in a journal or other proposed information-sharing approaches.

Submission of Proposals

The RFP process and receipt of proposals will be conducted via a web-based platform. Applicants should submit proposals via https://webportalapp.com/sp/vcf2 by October 31st, 2022. Applicants will be required to complete all sections of the grant application directly in the platform. PDF versions of the proposal cannot be uploaded into the platform. Additional detailed instructions for submitting the proposal are also included in the link. For technology support, please contact VCFinfo@charity.org.

It is the applicant’s responsibility to ensure that files are complete and transmitted by the deadline. The applicant bears full responsibility for data errors or omissions.

Key application requirements include:

- Project title, summary, and background/rationale that articulate a key research gap and/or specifies a target population (making it clear why this research is novel and how it will add to the current body of understanding)

- Research objectives and clear methodological approach, with timeline

- Measurement framework that outlines clear measures and intended plans for capturing data

- Dissemination plan

- Key project team members’ CVs/resumes

- Budget and budget narrative (The budget template can be found here.)

Ethical Considerations

The Fund will not support:

- Organizations that discriminate on the basis of age, gender, ethnicity, citizenship, disability, race, religion, marital status, sexual orientation, military service, or status.

- Religious organizations, unless the particular program will benefit a large portion of a community without regard to religious affiliation and does not duplicate the work of other agencies in the community.

- Organizations that engage in terrorist activities or are involved in any acts dangerous to human life that are in violation of the criminal laws of any country where we operate, in compliance with the U.S. Patriot Act as well as international anti-terrorism rules.

Conduct of Research and Informed Consent:

- Research must be of sound scientific merit and conducted in conformity with all applicable laws and regulations, and generally accepted standards of research. No clinical studies will be funded by the Fund.

- All grantees must obtain, in compliance with applicable laws and regulations, any necessary approvals of any research protocol and any data privacy authorization to use and disclose personal health information, if applicable.

- All grantees must use an informed consent form with all research participants. These should be uploaded to the Fund Manager upon completion of the project.

Review & Notification Process

Applications will be reviewed by the Fund Manager (housed at Global Impact) and the Advisory Council. Successful applicants will be notified on a rolling basis. Applicants that have been selected to receive a grant will be notified of selection, and final award determination will be dependent upon successful completion of background check/vetting and receipt of all necessary bank account information.

The Fund’s RFP window will remain open through October 31st, 2022. All grant proposals will be reviewed, scored, and selected (on a rolling basis) by November 30th, 2022.

Issuance of this RFP does not constitute an award commitment on the part of the Fund or the Alliance, nor does it commit the Fund or Alliance to pay for costs incurred in the preparation and submission of applications. Further, the Fund reserves the right to reject any or all applications received.


For more information and application details, see; Alliance for Advancing Health Online’s Vaccine Confidence Fund

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