President Joe Biden on Thursday, April 1, launched a $10 million ad campaign designed to push every American to get vaccinated against the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19).
Getting everybody vaccinated supposedly mean people no longer need to use face masks everywhere. This is why many got confused when the Biden administration also launched the "Mask Innovation Challenge."
The challenge will award up to $500,000 to anyone that can solve some of the most common downsides to wearing masks, including fogged glasses and irritated skin. These downsides are supposedly contributing to the reduced compliance with mask mandates. (Related: COVID FASCISM: Biden administration plotting with corporations to push coronavirus vaccine passports that will discriminate against those with innate, functioning immune systems.)
Biden's ad blitz, called the "We Can Do This" campaign, is being handled by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Its main goal is to increase confidence in coronavirus vaccines. It has purchased multimillion-dollar ad buys, four of which will air in April.
One of the ads is in Spanish and will be airing in Spanish-language media to target the Latin American community. Another ad will be narrated by prominent Black public intellectual Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and is aimed at the African American community.
The campaign will also be releasing a series of online advertisements on social media websites, including a series of pro-vaccine images that people can use to frame their profile pictures on Facebook. The goal here is to encourage friends and families of the people who don the picture frames to get vaccinated. Facebook has already agreed to promote this.
Along with the television ads and the social media picture frames, the We Can Do This campaign also plans to equip "trusted voices" – such as doctors and community leaders – with information and resources "to tout the safety and efficacy of the coronavirus vaccine."
These so-called trusted voices will be organized under the campaign's COVID-19 Community Corps. The Community Corps has already signed up nearly 300 volunteer organizations, including medical associations, sports leagues, rural groups, unions and faith congregations.
Some groups that have joined the Community Corps will be specifically used to target American conservatives who may be hesitant to take the vaccine, including NASCAR, some veterans' organizations and evangelical Christian groups.
Listen to Situation Update, a special breaking news episode of the Health Ranger Report podcast by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, as he talks about how the push to get every American vaccinated is money laundering scheme designed to enrich the pharmaceutical companies that created them.
Americans have until April 21 to submit new mask design ideas
The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), an office within the HHS, is handling the Mask Innovation Challenge. According to BARDA, Americans will have until April 21 to submit their new mask design ideas.
"With this mask challenge, we want to get people across the country involved in developing new masks that are both effective and comfortable," said HHS Acting Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response Nikki Bratcher-Bowman in a statement announcing the contest. "This will help us control COVID-19 and be better prepared for future public health emergencies."
Prototype designs must address certain common frustrations with regular face masks that make people less likely to comply with required mask usage. These common downsides include "speech intelligibility," "fogging of eyeglasses during use" and "physical discomfort with use, particularly in hot and humid environments."
The top 40 mask design ideas will be selected to move up to a pitch competition. In this stage, they will present their ideas to a panel of experts. The panel will then select the 10 best submissions, who will each receive a cash prize of up to $10,000.
The top 10 finalists will then advance to a "proof-of-concept" phase where they have to create their masks. These masks will be tested by federal and partner laboratories. As many as five chosen winners will split $400,000.
BARDA's Mask Innovation Challenge was announced as federal health officials redouble their pleas for Americans to obey mask mandates, or to continue wearing masks despite several states lifting their mask requirements.
The We Can Do This campaign hopes to speed up Biden's plan to return the country to "normalcy" by July 4. It is unclear why Biden is looking to improve masks if his administration is looking to make sure they are no longer necessary within several months.
Learn more about how the Biden administration is handling the coronavirus pandemic by reading the latest articles at Pandemic.news.
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