“Bakuna Brochure”, a vaccine awareness brochure for seniors

September 18, 2021

As more and more people get vaccinated, there are people getting left behind: our lolos and lolas. As of July 2021, only 25% of Filipino seniors have been vaccinated, while younger lower-risk groups are getting a head start on the vaccinations. Indeed everyone needs to get vaccinated when they can, but our most vulnerable elders are not getting their “bakuna” (Filipino for vaccine) as planned.

Unfortunately fake news and/or fear of side effects had not helped in reaching more and more of our lolos and lolas.

Initial sketches and character studies for the “Bakuna Brochure”.

Keeping things simple

After the Universal Social Pension illustration I made for the Coalition of Services of the Elderly or COSE, they had an urgent request for a brochure for unvaccinated seniors. They wanted to create a simple, printable, and copy-friendly brochure for older people and their families.

Due to the tight schedule we went ahead and used the same look and feel from the Universal Social Pension artwork that I made before this project. The characters had a simple two-color palette, and were made of different folks from any given community. Taking the same theme would expedite the process, so that’s what we did with the brochure.

The colors were later changed, but the simple color palette and line work were still similar to the Universal Social Pension illustration.

Universal Social Pension neighborhood — Universal Social Pension artwork made for COSE in 2021.

Two characters at a post-vaccination photo booth — The two main characters of the “Bakuna Brochure” getting their picture taken after getting vaccinated. This is on the front cover of the brochure.

The Department of Health had existing materials that helped debunk myths and relay facts to people who might have apprehensions about getting vaccinated. COSE translated these official materials from English to Filipino, but they needed help portraying them visually in their brochure.

They also needed the brochure to be compact and easily reproducible. It had to be a size that was commonly used by home or office printers and copy machines. With this, the content also had to be clear even after being printed or copied from a home or office.

After going with a brochure with A4 dimensions, with a single fold down the middle to make a simple booklet, I created the set of characters including older persons and doctors to help portray the vaccine information.

Sketch of vaccine recipients with doctors — Some of the initial characters proposed for the 1st draft of the brochure.

I then made a layout centering the characters, surrounding them with the information which was placed into speech bubbles. The artwork and layout had to be made so that the final brochure could be copied, printed, and folded before being disseminated to the communities.

Printable COVID-19 vaccine brochure in Filipino — The color version of the brochure printed at home.

The artwork was placed on an A4-sized layout with sizable margins on the edges so it could be easily copied and distributed by communities without cutting out the content.

A copier-friendly replica of the brochure was made with more contrast so that it could be easily copied using most copy machines. We printed a copy with just black ink and thankfully it was still clear and legible.

Dimensions of the COVID-19 vaccine brochure — An even more print and copier-friendly version was made with additional contrast and more blacks and whites.

The copier and printer-friendlier version of the brochure with more contrast, blacks and grayscale.

Thinking of our elders

The brochure and the information from the DOH is ultimately trying to reduce vaccination hesitancy in people, let alone our elders. I thought of my aunt in Bohol who told me she was afraid to get vaccinated a few months ago. I told her that it would be safe, but she seldom listened to my view when she believed in something with certainty. I could hear the conviction in her voice when she said that her peers also expressed the same sentiments. There seemed to be no way for me to convey my thoughts over the phone.

Sometimes I wonder what life would have been like if my mom was still around. She was 73 when she passed away in 2018. If she were alive, she probably would have gotten vaccinated since it would have meant that she could leave the house. She hated staying home, which also made me shudder at how she would have fared during the pandemic today.

Me and my mama — Mama and I out and about before she passed, and many years before the pandemic.

When the project was done, I thought of my loved ones. And your loved ones too basically. We all know people, of various ages, who have passed because of the COVID-19 disease. But if only we could get more people to get vaccinated, we can save more lives. I’m hoping our brochure will change even just one mind, who knows. Hopefully at least one more aunt, uncle, lolo, or lola, will change their mind and get vaccinated.