Social Media Engagement With Cancer Awareness Campaigns Declined During the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election Emily K. Vraga , Jacek R. Radzikowski, Anthony Stefanidis, Arie Croitoru, Andrew T. Crooks, Paul L. Delamater, Dieter Pfoser, and Kathryn H. Jacobsen Cancer awareness campaigns compete with other health and social issues for public attention. We examined whether public engagement with breast cancer and prostate cancer declined in 2016 during the U.S. presidential election compared to 2015 on Twitter and Google Trends. We found that attention to breast cancer and prostate cancer declined in 2016 before the election as compared to 2015 in Twitter posts and Google searches. The findings suggest that cancer information seeking behavior, passive exposure to health communication, and active participation in social media about cancer all decreased during the peak weeks of the 2016 election season. Future health promotion initiatives and information dissemination efforts will benefit from monitoring the major issues garnering social media attention and then adjusting their timing or communication strategies to ensure that public engagement with their key policy messages remains strong when emerging news stories capture public interest. KEY WORDS: Twitter, breast cancer, prostate cancer Introduction Health education and awareness campaigns for cancer and other diseases increasingly use social media as part of strategic communication efforts to reach targeted communities (Bravo & Hoffman-Goetz, 2017; Patel, Chang, Greysen, & Chopra, 2015; Sedrak, Cohen, Merchant, & Schapira, 2016; Burton, Giraud-Carrier, Rollins, & Draper, 2013). Two prominent examples of these initiatives are National Breast Cancer Awareness Month (NBCAM), in October, and Movember, which promotes men’s health and prostate cancer awareness in November. Previous studies have quantified the substantial Internet traffic and media attention generated by these campaigns (Jacobsen & Jacobsen, 2011; Thackeray et al., 2013). While some criticism has been raised about the emphasis on fundraising and on expressions of support such as wearing pink or growing a mustache that do not promote World Medical & Health Policy, Vol. 9, No. 4, 2017 456 doi: 10.1002/wmh3.247 # 2017 Policy Studies Organization