Dr Meenal Viz, Dr Nishant Joshi and baby Radhika are the Joshi trio who have been campaigning for healthcare workers throughout the pandemic. Last year, during the first wave of the pandemic, Dr Meenal Viz was the pregnant protester outside Downing Street when Radhika was a foetus. The protest gained worldwide media attention and now Meenal and Nishant hope to use their platform to spread positivity, hope, and help clear any misunderstandings around the vaccine. Changing the world one TikTok at a time!

Nishant works in General Practice and has played a big role in working with local communities to start important dialogue around the vaccines. He has seen the impact of the virus on ethnic minority groups and has been working closely with community leaders to share informed messages around the vaccine. Meenal has been working from home with Radhika, focusing on campaigns to help inform women who are either pregnant, planning to be pregnant, or breastfeeding to make informed choices around the vaccine.

Outside of work, Nishant is a bassist and writes songs about social injustice with his band, The Palpitations (and Baby Radhika is Nishant’s biggest fan). While Meenal has her own podcast, ‘Meenal’s World’, where she interviews trailblazers every week and hopes to educate and empower women across the world. 

Sean Elias is working as part of the Covid-19 vaccine trial team both in the lab and as part of the SciComms team at the Jenner Institute, University of Oxford.

Sean is a postdoctoral immunologist and  ‘Public Engagement with Research’ (PER) leader based. He has a keen interest in the human immune system with previous work on T cells, B cells and antibodies for various diseases including Malaria, Ebolavirus, Salmonella and now Covid-19. On the SciComms front, Sean has a keen interest in developing educational materials for schools and the general public, in particular through the medium of board games. During the pandemic he has also provided photos, videos, explainers and most recently GIFS to the world’s media on behalf of the Covid-19 vaccine research team.

When not in the lab Sean is a keen triathlete, cricketer & football player, avid board gamer and lover of ALL things Star Wars.

Samantha Vanderslott is interested in public attitudes to vaccination, for routine vaccines and during outbreaks, as well as vaccine policies, in how these differ across countries and time. Since the COVID-19 pandemic began she has been researching views about potential vaccines and the increase in misinformation and disinformation.

Samantha is a health sociologist based in the Oxford Vaccine Group, at the University of Oxford, UK. She has worked there for the past four years following her PhD in Science and Technology Studies at University College London. Her research mainly uses qualitative methods and concentrates on health, society, and policy topics.