‘Solve the supply and the problem of public acceptance will solve itself.’
COMING from multi-media expert Senate President Vicente Sotto III, the idea that politicians should keep away from appearing in COVID-19 vaccine promotion infomercials holds water.
Sotto said using politicians and spending government funds for the purported objective of convincing Filipinos to take the jab could just turn the public off. He said, “It will not sit well with the public. I’ve been gauging the pulse of the public for 40 years and I know that they won’t like that. The infomercial won’t be effective if you use politicians in it.”
The Senate president believes that the government will just throw money away in this suggestion of having President Duterte, Vice President Leni Robredo or any senator, congressman or politician in a health-related promotion video. The reason for this is, in Sotto’s own words, “magka-cancel out. Merong maniniwala, merong matu-turn off. Kinansel-out mo lang, nagtapon ka lang ng pera.”
The suggestion that Duterte and Robredo appear together in a “joint public service announcement” that aims to boost public acceptance and confidence in the safety of COVID-19 vaccines came from Sen. Joel Villanueva. This triggered an avalanche of comments from noisy netizens, and even started a war of words between the spokesmen of the President and the VP — these necessary functionaries in high office who look for arguments to blow up to earn their salaries.
Sotto is not averse to making the vaccine infomercial, but not with politicians as endorsers.
He thinks ordinary but credible people such as athletes or famous personalities speaking in favor of inoculation will do the trick. If you use politicians, it would amount to “plugging” and in this day and age of the Internet, every one can easily see the ruse.
On another plane, advertisements and infomercials are done with the objective of reaching a lot of people, influencing their minds to adopt a certain brand, idea or course of action. A good campaign will send waves and waves of consumers and believers and this will need a huge supply of the goods intended to be sold.
The bigger question here is this: is the government ready with the vaccine supply, in case the masses of our people come rushing to the gates of Malacañang to be vaccinated, having this newfound desire for the jabs following the push triggered by good infomercials?
So long as there are people willing to be sanctioned for jumping the line in vaccination sites, we believe Filipinos have enough confidence now in the vaccines, and thus many desire to be vaccinated.
Solve the supply and the problem of public acceptance will solve itself.
