Strategic communication must to fight Covid-19

The world is grappling to fight and overcome the coronavirus outbreak. But there is still no effective treatment or vaccine.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has emphasised on social distancing and self-isolation as an effective way to control the outbreak. And these measures of social distancing and lockdown have been implemented in all countries affected by coronavirus.

This behavioral therapy, which was not applied before 1918, is still the only option to combat Covid-19. During the 1918 influenza pandemic, some 50 to 100 million deaths were reported worldwide. Majority of the population practiced social distancing to help control the outbreak.

Mahamudul Haque

All social distancing rules and health messages are more focused on preventive measures to save lives and communicating these messages can work like a vaccine. While we know about social distancing, its effectiveness in preventing coronavirus has not been aired properly.

A recent study of BRAC Institute of Governance and Development found that people are confused about "stay at home," "social distancing," "quarantine," and "lockdown." Each of these terms means different things to different people especially given the everyone's varied socio-economic backgrounds in Bangladesh. It says many people wear masks when they are alone but remove it once they meet a friend, or elderly, or a customer.

Sometimes Covid-19 preventive messages disseminated among the population are not clear, simple and understandable. It is imperative to boil down and simplify technical jargons so that awareness messages are clear and in-tune with socio-cultural and religious norms of the target audience.

Strategic communication can be a solution and we should undertake a national communication programme to eradicate Covid-19. It can work like a lifesaving drug or vaccine by raising awareness, knowledge, changing attitudes, practice or behaviour.  

Some proven communication models exist to initiate a plan of action. P-Process is one of them, which has been used since 1982 as a key to designing successful strategic communication programmes for strengthening public health worldwide. Five steps are followed to fulfill the goal of P-Process. They are analysis (of the target people and situation), strategic design (for fixing objectives, channels, and plan of action etc) development and testing (of messages and materials), implementation and monitoring as well as evaluation and re-planning.

The author is faculty of Mass Communication & Journalism, Begum Rokeya University, Rangpur