Ripple Effects: Keeping the world’s attention on Polio

THE BRIEF

Polio eradication in Africa has always been told through numbers: doses administered, cases prevented, systems strengthened. But numbers don’t sustain urgency. People do.

Since 2024, Rooftop has partnered with UNICEF on a multi-country advocacy campaign marking milestones in Africa’s fight against polio. UNICEF needed a way to keep global attention on a disease many assume is already history, without losing the scientific rigour behind the progress.

THE CREATIVE

Working across East, Southern, West and Central Africa, we leaned into local realities rather than global statistics. Mini-documentaries filmed in Mozambique, Madagascar, the DRC, Kenya, Angola and Ethiopia centred on the parents, vaccinators, community leaders and survivors whose everyday courage keeps eradication efforts moving. Their testimonies carried the science, weaving programmatic milestones through intimate, personal stories.

Alongside the country films, we built a campaign anthem video, blending kinetic text, motion graphics and urgent sound design to distil complex messaging into something bold and immediate.

Running through everything was a single idea: Ripple Effects. One vaccination, one drop, spreading outward into stronger health systems and more resilient communities. We extended that metaphor across reels, photography, social cards, GIFs, carousels and quote graphics, built for multilingual rollout across UNICEF’s Africa and global channels.

THE FILMS

THE IMPACT

The Q1 2025 flagship launch reached 37.5 million people, generating 11.3 million ThruPlays and over 248 million impressions. The Q2 2025 rollout, including GIFs, anthem videos and Ripple Effects shorts, reached a further 27.7 million people with 35 million ThruPlays, while supporting photo and web content added 23.4 million reach and 88.8 million impressions. By Q3 2025, localised stories from Madagascar and Mozambique were reaching new audiences through targeted Meta and YouTube activity.

The campaign reframed polio eradication as a story of progress and perseverance, not a distant medical statistic, with engagement that outperformed global NGO benchmarks for cost-efficiency and reach. It energised advocacy momentum by showing eradication as a collective victory, and set a template for how global health stories can hold onto technical rigour without losing emotional resonance. Every drop of vaccine is a spark of resilience with the power to transform whole communities.

THE DETAILS