During the COVID-19 pandemic, the vulnerability of refugees and asylum seekers exacerbated. At the same time, this group is in high risk of being disregarded in terms of COVID-19 vaccination. Inter alia, they are less present in ongoing global initiatives, such as COVAX, and lack financial resources and political support.

Our team aims to participate in improving the situation. In a first step, we concentrated on the Island Lesbos, hosting around 50’000 transiting refugees. This led us to the following challenge-question: How might we facilitate vaccine availability for migrants in refugee camps fleeing to Europe and stranded in Lesbos?

Subsequently, we focus on two action-points: Firstly, distributing the vaccine, including securing enough vaccination and transporting it safely to the camp. This requires support of several parties. Thus, we secondly need to raise awareness of the importance of the project within the local popoulation, politicians, and refugees themselves.

Regarding the distribution, we strive to build a multi-stakeholder task force which creates an action plan for processing vaccination in Q1 2021. The task force should coordinate efforts by the public and the private sectors (including NGOs).

In order to raise the support amongst the local public and greek politicians, we aim to organize a community event and to create a social media campaign, explaining the negative externalities of non-vaccinated refugees. Refugees will be targeted through campaigns that highlight the importance of being vaccinated.

The impacts of the project are severe. On a short-term basis, we ensure that a critical amount of refugees will receive a dose of vaccination. The mid-term outcome is an improvement in the overall health situation leading to a boost in the economy. Most importantly, the project will serve as a blueprint to provide vaccines to other refugee camps across the globe, and can ultimately be implemented for future pandemics.