Podcast — WHO's Advice for Health System Marketers and Communicators

Resources in Today's Episode

• WHO infodemic management 50 actions tracker
• Johns Hopkins COVID-19 profiling by country 
• The online competition between pro and anti-vaccination views
• Listen to this episode on-the-go through our podcast site

Key Takeaways

The Infodemic Landscape

• An infodemic is the widespread sharing of misinformation (false information spread accidentally) and disinformation (false information spread with an agenda) that makes COVID-19 interventions challenging. 
• There is too much information on COVID-19, making it difficult for the general public to discern between factual and non-factual information.
• Frequent shifts in recommendations made by trusted leaders continue to damage the public’s trust in the information they receive. 

Four tips for combatting misinformation

1. Get to know your audience by conducting surveys, performing social media analyses, and continue to refine how you listen to your audience based on your findings. 
2. Distill science and research into a more understandable format to make information more approachable. 
3. Build resilience to misinformation by educating the public on misinformation, how it spreads, and why it’s important to report.  
4. Engage with local communities by working with religious leaders, employers, unions, chambers of commerce, and other trusted local groups to amplify good health information. 

How social media affects the infodemic

• Social media can accelerate misinformation, therefore we must standardize how to respond to misinformation by analyzing how it is shared, how it jumps channels, and how interactions vary across channels. 
• Around 67% of people identify providers as a trusted source of information while only 11% report social media as a trusted source.