Communicating Through a Pandemic (PDF)

Dr. Amelia Burke-Garcia is a seasoned health communications professional with nearly 20 years of experience in health communication program planning, implementation and evaluation, with specific expertise in developing and evaluating digital and social media communication and research. At NORC, she leads the organization's Digital Strategy and Outreach Program Area, where she designs and implements strategies that leverage the power of digital media to influence behavior. In this role, Burke-Garcia develops new digital and mobile data collection methodologies and communication solutions. Most recently, she acted as director for the award-winning How Right Now/Que Hacer Ahora campaign, which is aimed at increasing people's ability to cope and be resilient amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. She currently leads two grants focused on exploring vaccine hesitancy amongst communities of color which build on her earlier work exploring messages and motivations of vaccine hesitant or refusing social media influencers (findings from which were published in Vaccine in 2020). Over the course of her career, Dr. Burke-Garcia has spearheaded some of the most innovative communication programs and studies on a variety of health topics including designing a targeted social media intervention with mommy bloggers to help social media users lower their risk for breast cancer and leveraging MeetUp groups and the Waze mobile application to move people to action around flu vaccination and HIV testing, respectively. She is the author of the book entitled, Influencing Health: A Comprehensive Guide to Working with Online Influencers and has been named to VeryWellHealth.com's list of 10 Modern Female Innovators Shaking Up Health Care. She holds a PhD in Communication from George Mason University, a Master's degree in Communication, Culture, and Technology from Georgetown University, and a joint honours Bachelor's degree in International Development Studies and Humanistic Studies from McGill