Communicating Through a Pandemic: A Chronicle of Experiences, Lessons Learned, and a Vision for the Future

Silver Award Winner from the Nonfiction Authors Association “The book is equal parts ‘how-to guide’ for effective health communications and a memoir of surviving a global pandemic. I appreciated reading about Burke-Garcia’s personal reflections about her experiences of isolation, uncertainty and exhaustion during quarantine. She shares her experiences and observations in a relatable and accessible manner. Knowing about the author’s personal struggles made me lean into what she had to share from her professional experience leading a communications campaign. Throughout the book, she explores data and research about communication needs among people from diverse groups and presents a sensible critique of the media environment.” – Nonfiction Book Award Outbreaks, epidemics, and pandemics are nothing new. Over the last several decades, we have been through numerous—Zika, Ebola, H1N1. The COVID‐19 pandemic, however, has challenged us like never before. During this time, we have struggled to work remotely, to balance work and children’s school schedules, and to manage finances in the face of lost or furloughed jobs. We have worried about our loved ones getting sick and being able to support themselves, and we have faced the loneliness that comes with social distancing. It has affected us individually and globally—but we have not all experienced this pandemic in exactly the same way. Some communities have been hit harder in terms of sickness and death rates from COVID‐19. Many have felt the economic pressures of the pandemic more acutely. Still others have struggled disproportionately with the mental health impacts. Context has mattered in this pandemic. There is one common thread that runs through everything we have experienced though: the role that communication has played in managing this pandemic. Whether we are talking about communication about the virus and mitigation strategies, communication between friends and family, the urgent crisis resulting in mis- and dis-information, our complex and diffuse media environment, or new workplace communication strategies, communication has been front and center in this pandemic. The role of communication has been integral to the success and failure of our ability to respond and adapt to and begin to recover from this pandemic—as individuals, collectively as communities, and as countries. As a result, issues such as preparedness, misinformation, literacy and comprehension of virus and vaccine science, health equity and mental health have all gained increased awareness during this time. This book unpacks the many and varied roles that communication has played over the course of this pandemic, in order to help public health professionals, marketers and health communicators, and policymakers alike to understand what we have been through, what has worked well, and what we have struggled with. It will help us learn from our experiences, so we communicate through pandemics more successfully in the future.

Table of Contents:
Chapter 1: Introduction – A.K.A. My Pandemic Story Chapter 2: A Brief History of Pandemic Communication Chapter 3: Dimensions of Crisis and Emergency Response Communication Chapter 4: Pandemic Communication in Our Current Media Communication Environment Chapter 5: Phases of Messaging Chapter 6: Audience Group Experiences Chapter 7: Disparities Already Existed – The Pandemic Just Exacerbated Them Chapter 8: Introducing How Right Now & Other Pandemic Communication Efforts Chapter 9: Building a Team and a Communication Campaign in the Middle of a Global Pandemic Chapter 10: Conclusions, Lessons Learned, and a Vision for the Future

About the Author :
Dr. Amelia Burke-Garcia is a seasoned health communications professional with nearly 20 years of experience in health communication program planning, implementation and evaluation, with specific expertise in developing and evaluating digital and social media communication and research. At NORC, she leads the organization's Digital Strategy and Outreach Program Area, where she designs and implements strategies that leverage the power of digital media to influence behavior. In this role, Burke-Garcia develops new digital and mobile data collection methodologies and communication solutions. Most recently, she acted as director for the award-winning How Right Now/Que Hacer Ahora campaign, which is aimed at increasing people’s ability to cope and be resilient amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. She currently leads two grants focused on exploring vaccine hesitancy amongst communities of color which build on her earlier work exploring messages and motivations of vaccine hesitant or refusing social media influencers (findings from which were published in Vaccine in 2020). Over the course of her career, Dr. Burke-Garcia has spearheaded some of the most innovative communication programs and studies on a variety of health topics including designing a targeted social media intervention with mommy bloggers to help social media users lower their risk for breast cancer and leveraging MeetUp groups and the Waze mobile application to move people to action around flu vaccination and HIV testing, respectively. She is the author of the book entitled, Influencing Health: A Comprehensive Guide to Working with Online Influencers and has been named to VeryWellHealth.com’s list of 10 Modern Female Innovators Shaking Up Health Care. She holds a PhD in Communication from George Mason University, a Master’s degree in Communication, Culture, and Technology from Georgetown University, and a joint honours Bachelor’s degree in International Development Studies and Humanistic Studies from McGill University.