Informing, Entertaining, Engaging
How Social Media Has Been Key for the District Health Unit
Keeping the public up to date, combating misinformation, and sometimes just bringing a smile to people’s faces are all part of what the Thunder Bay District Health Unit says it’s attempting to do with its social media presence during the COVID-19 pandemic.
On its social media feeds, the health unit provides near-daily updates on data surrounding new and resolved COVID-19 cases in its catchment area, weekly updates on vaccination rates, relevant news from health and government officials, information on vaccines, answers to questions from the public, other non-COVID-related public health news and information, as well as some other timely tidbits (they had several Pride-related posts throughout June, for example). Steven Bill, the coordinator of communications and new media at the health unit says one of the most important aspects of public health strategy—especially during the pandemic—is to reliably communicate information.
“This is sort of our time to shine,” says Bill. “The pandemic has presented an opportunity for the Thunder Bay District Health Unit to really get out there and do what it’s been doing all along to a much wider, larger audience.” That means using everything from a basic text post or link to other multimedia content, such as video (Bill credits his colleague Dan DePeuter with those). The goal, he adds, is to get people to engage with what is posted. “That’s really, at the end of the day, what we care about most,” Bill says. “That’s why it’s a very […] multi-pronged approach.”
Bill says the local health unit and its social media team have taken a number of cues from other Ontario health units, particularly Ottawa
Public Health. “They have been kind of paving the way for […] making public health sexy again, or maybe for the first time,” he says, adding that the two health units even frequently banter on Twitter. Kevin Parent, a program and project management officer with the Ottawa health unit, says that its social media strategy has evolved over the past several years, even before and during COVID.
“It’s audience first, it’s engagement based,” he says. “So much of our content comes from our audience. We read all the replies, we read all the comments, we follow local media, local influencers, and every time they post about something public health related—or these days pandemic related—we go into their post, read all their replies, and we gauge a feel. What’s the narrative, what’s the mood, what are the questions people have, what are the concerns people have?”
Both Parent and Bill say that everything their teams do and post is evidence-based. Parent says that can include researching how best to bring up and publicly post about a given topic, such as sensitive ones like sexual health. During the pandemic, public health’s role also includes combating misinformation around things like vaccines, the virus, and the pandemic itself. According to a Statistics Canada analysis from February using data from a survey series done in July 2020, 96% of Canadians who used the internet saw COVID-19 information that they suspected was misleading, false, or inaccurate. As well, 40% reported believing that information they saw was initially true, then later realizing it wasn’t. During the first few months of the pandemic, the StatsCan analysis found that just over half of all Canadians (53%) had shared COVID-19 information they found online without knowing if it was accurate.
“If we’re not present on these channels, if we’re not active and engaging and doing our best to combat the misinformation and the false narratives that are being put out there, […] those stories, those narratives will grab a hold and misguide and misdirect a whole slew of people,” Bill says. “We’re very intentional about stopping those misguided and misinformed pieces of information that spread.”
Bill says the local health unit gets dozens of comments or private messages weekly with dubious or false information. “Public health is always going to go where the science and the evidence leads us,” he says. “There’s never a hidden agenda or some kind of ulterior motive or anything to that effect. We are very transparent and we want our audience to trust the science as we do and to follow where that leads.”