Facebook connects people with state Covid vaccine info in US

San Francisco: Facebook has announced to connect people in the US with state-specific information from local health departments about vaccines and how people can get their jabs.

To do this, Facebook is replicating its state-by-state strategies it used during the US 2020 presidential election, since both voting and the vaccine rollout are handled by state and local authorities.

"Just as we ran state-specific notifications in News Feed about registering to vote and voting by mail ahead of each state's deadlines, we're tailoring Covid-19 vaccine notifications to coincide with each state opening their eligibility to all adults so we don't promote vaccines before everyone is eligible," the social network said in a statement on Monday.

"We are ultimately rolling out these notifications nationally across the US and globally as more countries expand vaccinations," it added.

When a state says the general public is eligible for a Covid vaccine, Facebook will show a notification to people in that state that connects them with their state health department or its Vaccine Finder.

From January through March, over three million people in the US clicked through News Feed promotions and Facebook COVID-19 Information Center to visit their state health website or local provider.

"We're also running these News Feed notifications in nearly 20 countries with more following soon. These notifications link to the country's ministry of health website for more information about the vaccines and booking an appointment," Facebook mentioned.