Facebook ramps up plans to deliver COVID-19 vaccines to underserved communities

COVID-19 vaccines to underserved communities.

The company said in a statement Wednesday it will partner with local nonprofits near their Menlo Park, California, headquarters to deliver vaccines via mobile truck to nearby schools and community spaces.

Anyone who receives a vaccine can also choose to pick up a box with a week’s worth of free meals and groceries, the social media giant said.

Facebook also plans to extend more funding support toward pop-up clinics in several cities, including Austin, Texas; New York; and Seattle.

The push by Facebook highlights the difficulties in distributing the vaccines to communities of color. According to an analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation, Black and Hispanic people in most states have received smaller shares of COVID vaccinations compared to the share of COVID cases.

users to find COVID vaccines through the platform and other apps like Instagram and WhatsApp. The CDC launched a Spanish-language vaccine finder on WhatsApp, while Instagram pushed notifications to users about vaccine information.

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Facebook has moved more aggressively to stamp out vaccine misinformation, including the removal of debunked claims and issuing warnings to groups who helped spread false information.a report from Advance Democracy found Facebook made significant progress in removing misinformation related to COVID vaccines.

Facebook is not the only company pushing to get more Americans vaccinated. In January, Google announced several steps, including opening up its sites for vaccines and laying out more information in Google searches on vaccines and where to find them.

Twitter, meanwhile, announced in March it would start labeling tweets that carried misinformation about the vaccines.

Jessica Guynn contributed to this report. Follow Brett Molina on Twitter: @brettmolina23.

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