SPRINGFIELD – U.S. Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) and U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) today announced that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has awarded $7,325,365 to Illinois to support education efforts about the COVID-19 vaccine and vaccination availability. The CDC also allocated an additional $1.977 million dollars for Chicago to boost current vaccination efforts. The funding was made available by the recently passed American Rescue Plan.
“With this federal funding, Illinois can continue to increase awareness, outreach, and confidence in COVID-19 vaccines,” said Durbin. “There’s still more work to do, but this funding will support tailored messages and effective strategies to enhance Illinois’ public health infrastructure as we confront one of the greatest public health undertakings in American history. I’m proud of the work our state and local health departments have done so far, and I’ll continue to work alongside federal and state leaders to provide for Illinois’ health departments in this time of crisis.”
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“Making sure as many Illinoisans as possible get vaccinated is one of the most important things we can do to reach to the other side of this public health crisis,” Duckworth said. “This federal funding will help our state reach and educate residents so we can efficiently and equitably get shots in arms. I’ll keep working alongside the Biden administration and Senator Durbin to support Illinoisans, especially those from hard-hit communities, as we continue making progress in overcoming this deadly virus.”
The CDC funding will be able to support a variety of outreach tools and resources including:
- A rapid Community Assessment Guide to identify and respond to vaccine education needs and develop targeted strategies for uptake in specific communities;
- Vaccine messages and toolkits to support vaccine education and outreach;
- Research on subpopulations;
- Visuals for TV, print, digital advertisements and;
- Survey data.
