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<p>Public Health England (PHE) produces a range of training materials for immunisers,
which includes information on vaccination programmes, training events and newsletters.
It collaborates with charities to support their work to improve healthcare worker
knowledge on meningococcal disease, including through the development and distribution
of information aimed at all healthcare professionals.</p><p> </p><p>In 2015-16, PHE
spent £50,000 on media to raise awareness of the Meningitis ACWY immunisation. A wide
range of communications with young people and their parents was undertaken. Media
budgets for financial year 2016-17 are not yet finalised.</p><p> </p><p>In 2016-17,
PHE provided a £24,000 grant to Meningitis Research Foundation and Meningitis Now,
to support their work to increase awareness and knowledge of meningitis and septicaemia
symptoms amongst parents. Activities included: inserting 350,000 copies of ‘Babywatch’
and ‘Totwatch’ information materials into the ‘red book’ provided to all new mothers;
distributing ‘Babywatch’ toolkit containing cards and posters to 500 maternity units
and special care baby units; and a social media campaign to promote Meningitis Now’s
‘Meningitis Signs and Symptoms’ app.</p><p> </p><p>Meningitis Now’s social media campaign
generated almost 4 million opportunities to see their adverts (“impressions”) and
there were 470,522 views of their videos about the symptoms of meningitis and septicaemia,
with the majority of views coming from people new to the charity. This resulted in
an 80% rise in downloads of the campaign app. The charity also had nearly 300 new
orders for signs and symptoms cards.</p><p> </p><p>Research conducted by PHE in 2016
showed a high level of awareness of meningitis. More than 80% of parents and 70% of
14-25 year olds reported that they had knowledge of meningitis.</p><p> </p><p>The
research commissioned by PHE confirmed that awareness of meningitis and septicaemia
is high amongst parents but gave recommendations on how existing charity promotional
materials could be improved to help parents.</p>
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