COVID revealed persistent gaps and inequities in health systems, providing a window into a broader opportunity for transformative change. To show how organizations can think differently about community planning and decision-making, we discuss a collaboration between Bridgeable and CommuniVax, where we combined social science research with human-centred design to take a novel approach to community engagement.

This panel features Dr. Tim MacLeod, Dr. Stephen Thomas, and Dr. Emily Brunson. We focus on:

• Fieldwork with hyperlocal communities, presenting themes on how communities responded to the crisis and how they are using gains in community planning and health equity to drive for lasting change.
• We explore the big pivot from mass vaccination pop-up clinics and information centers to hyperlocal ones, like barbershops, that are able to keep the community engaged in the fight for health equity and become a source for reliable information.
• We show an in-progress toolkit, and reflect on lessons learned in combining social science and human-centred design.