National Council of Negro Women (NCNW) Launches “Good Health WINs”
Washington, DC, February 10, 2021 — The National Council of Negro Women (NCNW), a leading national advocate for Black women, is launching Good Health Women’s Immunization Networks to raise awareness of the benefits of immunization as a critical element of good health. While our primary focus in the first year of Good Health WINs will be listening to and activating NCNW member networks around COVID-19 and other immunizations, we want to ensure their voices are heard beyond their own communities.
NCNW will work to amplify the voices of Black women, who make 80% of family medical decisions, in state and local health policy networks. It will also build trustworthiness as a key strategy for addressing vaccine hesitancy and promote efforts to achieve health equity. NCNW will work with state and local immunization coalitions, program managers, retailers and other vaccine stakeholders to improve understanding and access by increasing diverse representation.
Action is required now because of the Pandemic has had a grossly disproportionate impact on Black and brown communities, due to impact of myriad social determinants of health.
“This is a revolutionary partnership,” said Dr. Johnnetta Cole, president of NCNW. “We are helping communities find the information they need to make the right decision for themselves and their families. With careful attention to each community’s unique needs, we can build a lasting appreciation for good health.”
NCNW’s planned activities advance the CDC National Stakeholder Strategy for Achieving Health Equity, emphasizing reduction of health disparities, increased vaccination opportunities, vaccination education, and identification of the drivers of vaccine hesitancy. For a host of socio-economic reasons, Black and Hispanic populations are less likely to be vaccinated and more likely to suffer serious health consequences from vaccine-preventable diseases.
Good Health WINs will begin with a survey to gain more insight into community attitudes, a tool kit for state and local organizers, website and direct mail and texting programs to help close the gap for rural and older persons who may not have robust access to computers, a volunteer corps to assist with obtaining vaccination appointments and frequent virtual gatherings to disseminate latest information and learn about any barriers to access or reasons for hesitancy.
NCNW has assembled a world class team of experts and volunteers to shepherd Good Health WINs, including several of its 32 national membership organization affiliates, faith-based organizations, civic engagement specialists, healthcare providers and communications professionals to assure that project goals are met.
Vaccinate Your Family (VYF) is a partner in Good Health WINs and is one of the most experienced vaccination nonprofit organizations in the country. VYF will serve as a subject matter expert on vaccination.
Good Health WINs will initially focus on NCNW organizations in ten states with significant Black and Brown populations: Florida, Georgia, Pennsylvania, New York, Maryland, Ohio, Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, and New Jersey. Initial efforts will be coordinated with these NCNW’s affiliate organizations — The Links, Incorporated, Continental Societies, Inc., Women’s Home and Overseas Mission of the AME Zion Church, Women’s Missionary Society of the AME Church, National Black Nurses Association and Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc. Good Health WINs will also collaborate with the Women’s National Basketball Players Association (“WNBPA”) who will lend their credibility and influence to Good Health WINs. The National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference (NHCLC) has agreed to translate into Spanish and distribute key materials to their extensive membership.
WNBPA President Nneka Ogwumike said, “The WNBPA’s partnership with the National Council of Negro Women is significant because it represents a powerful extension of our work around the Black Lives Matter movement in connection with our efforts to combat the ongoing global health crisis. Time and time again, we have demonstrated that we are much more than athletes. We are highly educated individuals, global citizens, and dedicated activists in our communities around the world. Right now, there is a critical need for strong voices to share reliable information and spread awareness to a variety of communities that need it now more than ever.”
Good health WINs Goals include the following:
- Help end the COVID-19 pandemic, which is wreaking havoc on communities of color, lower income families and frontline workers;
- Promote candid conversations and mutually respectful relationships between Black women, communities of color and policy makers;
- Increase public understanding and acceptance of immunization as an essential path to good health;
- Encourage WWW — wash hands, watch distance and wear a mask; Reduced COVID19-related health disparities;
- Support increased testing, contact tracing, isolation options, and preventive care and disease management in populations at increased risk for COVID 19;
- Advance equity in nationwide distribution and administration of future COVID 19 vaccines;
- Promote evidence-based policies, systems, and environmental strategies to mitigate social and health inequities related to COVID 19;
- Reduce COVID 19 associated stigma and implicit bias;
- Expanded cultural responsiveness and application of health equity principles to an increasingly diverse COVID 19 responder workforces;
- Promote trustworthiness of healthcare institutions and systems.
About the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases
The mission of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases (NCIRD) is the prevention of disease, disability, and death through immunization and by control of respiratory and related diseases.
Their challenge is to effectively balance their efforts in the domestic and global arenas as well as accommodate the specific needs of all populations at risk of vaccine-preventable diseases from children to older adults.
About Vaccinate Your Family
Vaccinate Your Family (VYF) — VYF was founded as Every Child By Two in 1991 by former First Lady Rosalynn Carter and former First Lady of Arkansas Betty Bumpers on the heels of one of the last major measles outbreaks in the U.S. The organization is dedicated to ensuring people of all ages are protected against deadly vaccine-preventable diseases.
Since the founding of the organization, VYF has served as the sole conduit of vaccine education for the staff of the USDA’s Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). VYF offers a myriad of annual education opportunities to ensure the health of the over seven million low-income women, pregnant women, infants, and children who participate in the program annually. VYF has conducted hundreds of educational programs, webinars, conferences, and training programs for policymakers, nurses and other medical personnel, coalitions, and vaccine advocates over the past thirty years.
Due to their deep experience with vaccine partners and policymakers, VYF is uniquely positioned to expand the impact of NCNW’s advocates.
About NCNW
National Council of Negro Women, Inc. is a Washington, D.C.-based charitable organization making a difference in the lives of women, children, and families through a four-pronged strategy that emphasizes entrepreneurship, health equity, STEAM education, and civic engagement. Founded 85 years ago, NCNW has 300 community and campus-based sections and thirty-two national affiliates representing more than Two Million women and men.
NCNW’s programs are grounded on a foundation of critical concerns known as Four for the Future. NCNW promotes education with a particular focus on science, technology, engineering, and math; encourages entrepreneurship, financial literacy, and economic stability; educates women about good health and HIV/AIDS; promotes civic engagement and advocates for sound public policy and social justice. NCNW is known for its work to educate college age women about HIV/AIDs and for producing the Black Family Reunion. Current programs include GirlTech, HBCU College Fair, Millennial Entrepreneurs and Adulting 101. Johnnetta Betsch Cole, Ph.D., is the National Chair and Seventh President of NCNW. NCNW has campaigned for clean water for Flint, MI, voting rights, and SNAP benefits. For more information please visit www.ncnw.org or the brand’s social channels via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or LinkedIn.
For more information, press only:
Tkeban X.T. Jahannes, Director of Communications
202.737.0120 ext. 178 404.944.1615 — cell
tjahannes@ncnw.org
