VIRA, the Vaccine Chatbot | International Vaccine Access Center

Challenge

As of August 2022, COVID-19 deaths have plateaued at a still-unacceptable rate, with thousands of deaths occurring in the U.S. on a weekly basis. Being up to date with vaccination provides increased protection against infection, yet fewer than 4 in 10 Americans have received a booster shot. Misinformation is strongly associated with declines in vaccine uptake, perpetuating the spread of SARS-CoV-2.

Approach

VIRA, the Vaccine Information Resource Assistant, is a chatbot launched by Johns Hopkins and IBM Research in July 2021 to provide instant, expert-vetted responses in English and Spanish on over 200 concerns about COVID-19 vaccines. VIRA, which works in English and Spanish on a web-based chat environment as well as on WhatsApp, is powered by machine learning such that the chatbot has natural language understanding in English and Spanish. VIRA is supported through significant in-kind engineering contributions from IBM and funding from the COVID-19 Training Initiative, Bloomberg Philanthropies, and the Johnson & Johnson Foundation. Through a collaboration with Meta, VIRA has been adapted to WhatsApp and received advertising credits to reach and engage Spanish-speaking Facebook users.

Results

Through a collaboration with the National Association of County & City Health Officials (NACCHO), VIRA is being fully customized for use by five major U.S. health departments.
VIRA partnered with the Pamoja Institute in Toronto, Canada to create Auntie Betty X VIRA. Auntie Betty uses VIRA technology to recognize users’ questions expressed in their own words, responding with content tailored to address the concerns of the Black community in Toronto.
VIRA has been used by tens of thousands of users and adopted for use on the websites of health departments in seven states (see in Louisiana).
A Facebook campaign reached 1.6 million Spanish-speaking users, with Millennials the most likely to engage with VIRA.
VIRA’s social listening analysis of anonymous chats reveals leading questions and new concerns, including misinformation circulating over closed social media networks.