Going the extra mile to get vaxed

Generous corporates are helping to increase vaccination rates among our vulnerable communities.

Manaakitanga – hospitality, kindness, generosity, support – showing respect, generosity and care for others.

Several large businesses have donated ‘gift in kind’ to support the COVID-19 vaccination roll-out across Auckland, delivering additional manaakitanga support to our Māori and Pacific communities, and helping to increase vaccination rates among those more vulnerable.

The Northern Region Health Coordination Centre (NRHCC) has been working with Māori and Pacific vaccination providers to understand how else they might be able to help whānau through wraparound support services, whilst also talking to them about vaccinations and how they can help ensure our Māori and Pacific whānau and community are safe from COVID-19.

Discussions with whānau often indicate other serious welfare needs, which the NRHCC has been helping its provider partners manage where possible. This has included many basic welfare needs like assistance with food and essential household items, as well as help with energy, petrol and telecommunications costs.

To support these requests, we have partnered with a range of large corporates to ensure many of these basic needs can be met, and the NRHCC has been working with providers to ensure this support can be delivered as part of its vaccination manaakitanga.

Thank you to these businesses; Countdown, The Warehouse, Z Energy and Vodafone for generously donating ‘gift in kind’ vouchers to support the vaccination roll-out and help keep all our communities safe.

Vaccination providers say that being able to provide this additional layer of support has been a huge factor in being able to reach some whānau who may have previously been reluctant to consider vaccinations, often because their priorities were more focused on meeting the essential welfare needs of their whānau.

A series of weekend events, like that at Trust Stadium (pictured above), are reaching these communities, and the corporates’ support is continuing to encourage people to turn out and get their vaccinations.

Every day brings us closer to 90% full vaccination – we’re proud to support the community and teams coming together to ensure we’re all protected; the weekend’s events over 19-21 November reached over 3,300 people first and second doses.

Together, we can work towards reaching our vaccination targets and help ensure everyone is protected from COVID-19, so we can all enjoy our Kiwi summer.