Using Music and Animations for COVID-19 Prevention: The Case of a Scientific Program

The use of music to sensitize, inform, and entertain for purposes of social organizing and public pedagogy is receiving increasing attention from scholars. This approach is usually selected because it allows a targeted message to reach large populations using varying mediums of transmission, such as social media, radio, television, and word of mouth. The lyrics can borrow from scientific information, political change messages, or a catchphrase common to many. It is also common to infuse a catchy line that most can remember, and markedly prominent musicians might come together to work on such a project to encourage fundraising or to push the message. The purpose of this article is to describe how a scientific organization based in the United States worked with budding musicians in Kenya to create music to inform communities in East Africa about prevention of coronavirus/COVID-19.