Los Angeles, Calif. (October 8, 2013) – The California Endowment announced today a $500,000 grant for Obamacare education to Hollywood Health & Society, a program at the USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center that provides entertainment industry professionals with accurate and timely information for storylines on health and climate change.
The 18-month grant will be used to inform television writers, producers, and others involved in television programming on Obamacare facts and implementation information in California and nationwide.
“Our experience has shown that the public gets just as much, if not more, information about current events and important issues from their favorite television shows and characters as they do from the news media and online resources,” said USC Annenberg professor Martin Kaplan, principal investigator of Hollywood, Health & Society since 2001, and founding director of The Norman Lear Center. “This grant will allow us to ensure that industry practitioners have up-to-date, relevant facts on health care reform to integrate into their storylines and projects.”
Specifically, the grant will be used to conduct phone and in-person briefings and consultations with staff from various television shows, produce online resources, organize subject-matter expert panels, air public service announcements, and track Obamacare-related depictions on primetime and Spanish-language television.
“People take action when they see the same information from multiple streams. Our partnership with Hollywood Health & Society will help to ensure that we reach people where they are—in their homes and living rooms—and complement our efforts and efforts by Covered California to reach Californians through the news, online and print media,” said Daniel Zingale, Senior Vice President of Healthy California at The California Endowment.
Hollywood, Health & Society has a proven track record. From 2009-12, it supported 565 aired storylines which spanned 35 networks and 91 shows on a variety of health topics, including health coverage. In June, 2013, HH&S hosted a panel discussion drawing more than 100 entertainment industry professionals to learn about healthcare reform and its implications for their storylines and characters.
The partnership with Hollywood Health & Society is part of The California Endowment’s statewide Get Covered outreach and enrollment campaign, known as Asegúrate in Spanish. The multimedia, multi-year campaign was launched in June and aims to build awareness among Californians about Obamacare and to encourage enrollment in health care coverage. For more information about the campaign, visit www.getcoveredca.com.
About The California Endowment
The California Endowment, a private, statewide health foundation, was established in 1996 to expand access to, quality health care for underserved individuals and communities, and to promote fundamental affordable improvements in the health status of all Californians. Headquartered in downtown Los Angeles, The Endowment has regional offices in Sacramento, Oakland, Fresno and San Diego, with program staff working throughout the state. The Endowment challenges the conventional wisdom that medical settings and individual choices are solely responsible for people's health. Through its ‘Health Happens Here’ campaign and 10-year initiative for Building Healthy Communities, The Endowment is creating places where children are healthy, safe and ready to learn. At its core, The Endowment believes that health happens in neighborhoods, schools, and with prevention. For more information, visit The California Endowment’s homepage at www.calendow.org.
About Hollywood Health & Society
Hollywood, Health & Society (HH&S), a program of the USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center, provides entertainment industry professionals with accurate and up-to-date information for health and climate change storylines. With funders including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, The California Endowment, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Barr Foundation, the Grantham Foundation, ClimateWorks, Skoll Global Threats Fund, the Energy Foundation. HH&S recognizes the profound impact that entertainment media have on individual knowledge and behavior. HH&S supplies writers and producers with free health and climate change information through individual consultations, tip sheets, briefings, panel discussions at the Writers Guild of America, West, a quarterly newsletter and web links to health information and public service announcements. The program also conducts extensive evaluations on the content and impact of TV health storylines. For more information, visit usc.edu/hhs. Follow us at facebook.com/HollywoodHealth and @HollywdHealth on Twitter.
About Get Covered
Get Covered is a multi-year bilingual outreach and enrollment campaign designed to educate Latino and lower-income Californians about Obamacare and to drive them to enroll in Medi-Cal or private insurance through Covered California, the state’s health benefits marketplace. The campaign’s target audience represents groups with the highest percentage of uninsured. The campaign includes a major Spanish-language media partnership among Univisión, Telemundo, and La Opinión-impreMedia, who are among the nation’s largest Spanish-language media outlets; The California Endowment, a private foundation advocating for health and health equity; and Covered California. Together, the three media partners reach nearly 100 percent of the state’s Latino population—approximately 15 million Californians—using television and print reporting, public service announcements, documentaries, and digital media. To learn more, visit www.getcoveredca.com.
