To Overcome Vaccine Hesitancy, We Need a Better Patient Experience

Experts believe that herd immunity, contingent on 70% or more of the population is immune to the virus, is necessary to end this epidemic. Crossing the chasm to get to these numbers will require addressing concerns about getting vaccinated. It entails providing people with a superlative experience before, during, and after vaccination.

Ultimately, designing a successful vaccination experience will require local adaptation. What works in a largely professional, urban community will differ from what is effective in a working-class, rural one. It will also require rapid testing and iteration. A key tactic may be measuring the Net Promoter Score (NPS) of how people feel about having gotten vaccinated.

By thinking of the vaccine as a consumer product, vaccination as a service, and a high NPS as a goal, we can better design the end-to-end vaccination process and bring this pandemic to a close as quickly as possible.