Thank you for being here today. We are gathered not just to talk about health and immunizaton—but to talk about power. The power of information, the power of trust, and the power of stories. And who shapes those stories every day? You do.
Routine immunization is one of the most powerful public health tools we have. It quietly prevents more than 4 million deaths each year. It stops disease before it starts. It protects entire communities. And yet—it rarely makes the news. Why?
Because when something works too well, it disappears. Immunization has become a victim of its own success. Polio fades from memory. Measles becomes a footnote. And when danger isn’t visible, urgency vanishes. But disease doesn’t need airtime to come back. This is why media matter. Because you decide what gets seen and makes its way to the public agenda.
In an age of endless online scrolling, opinion spreads faster than facts. On social media, fear-based appeals get the most clicks and panic outpaces reason. But you—professional journalists—you have something more powerful than virality. You have the professional ethics, and the responsibility to elevate knowledge above the noise.
Routine immunization should never be routine news—shapeless, sterile, and buried in the back pages. We need stories that make people care before an outbreak reminds them why they should have cared all along. So I ask you: let’s not wait for tragedy to tell the story of routine immunization. Let’s tell it now—truthfully, powerfully, ethically.
