First things first new COVID vaccine ad campaign launches

The push to get millions more COVID-19 jabs into Australian arms will enter a new phase from Sunday, with a fresh advertising blitz launching across the country.

Dubbed First Things First, the campaign highlights the freedoms that vaccinated Australians will enjoy once the 70 and then 80 per cent vaccination targets set out in the national plan to begin re-opening the country are reached.

A still image from the new federal government COVID-19 vaccination advertising campaign.

It shows people in a range of every day settings - from pubs, family dinners, hairdressers and nightclubs through to a grandparent holding her grandchild and ends with a simple message: “Before we can do the thing we want to do, there is something we all need to do first - book your COVID-19 vaccination”.

Lieutenant-General John Frewen, who is in charge of the vaccine roll out to doctors and pharmacies across the country said the new campaign, which coincides with people aged 12 to 15 becoming eligible for the jab, was designed to mobilise all Australians - particularly younger ones - to get vaccinated.

“There are two elements of the First Things First campaign, to speak to those of us who have been living in areas of lockdown and are looking forward to our first tastes of freedom again, and to speak to those of us who are already enjoying the things we love to get vaccinated in order to keep them,” he said.

“We know about 80 per cent of Australians are either vaccinated â€" or intend to get vaccinated. With Moderna expected to arrive shortly and supplies of the Pfizer vaccine increasing, we have enough vaccines to ensure everyone who wants a vaccine can book in and get one.”

“We are setting vaccination records on an almost daily basis â€" and the next phase of the communications campaign will help to keep this momentum going.”

A total of 13,646,933 Australians, or 66.2 per cent of the population, have now had at least one COVID-19 jab and 8,482,722 people, or 41.1 per cent, are fully vaccinated.

The campaign will run across TV, radio, print, online, outdoor advertising and in shopping centres and comes two months after the Arm Yourself campaign was launched to ramp up Australia’s vaccination rates.

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James Massola is political correspondent for the Sun-Herald & Sunday Age. He won the Kennedy award for Outstanding Foreign Correspondent while posted in Jakarta and wrote The Great Cave Rescue. He was previously chief political correspondent.Connect via Twitter, Facebook or email.

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