Improved Risk Communication During Infectious Disease Crises

As cases of the Ebola disease emerge in Europe, the crisis is gaining increasing levels of media coverage. Certain types of coverage can foster fear and stigmatisation which leads to harmful consequences for the individuals, communities and countries involved. Therefore communication strategies that maximise opportunities and minimise risks are vital. That's why the TELL ME (Transparent communication in Epidemics: Learning Lessons from experience, delivering effective Messages, providing Evidence) project is working to develop models for improved risk communication during infectious disease crises.

In the case of Ebola, the stigma of being perceived to be connected with the outbreak in the affected countries is intense and may make individuals hesitant to come forward with suspected symptoms. It may also impact the larger African community in Europe, including those who may have been established here for many years. The TELL ME team is mindful that effective communication can make a crucial difference in this situation.

TELL ME is drawing on a range of disciplines (from public health to law and ethics) to develop original communication strategies regarding complicated messages as well as advice based on uncertainties. The aim is to develop a way of communicating that influences behaviours, reduces the spread of disease and avoids panic. The team is particularly keen to explore the huge potential of the information society in terms of evidence-based and participatory communication.

Stigmatisation as a result of poor communication affects not only individuals and families but entire countries. Paul Quinn of the TELL ME project notes the harmful consequences that he is seeing as a result of stigmatisation during this Ebola outbreak. He says: "This sense of fear and stigma also affects the way in which foreigners are willing to deal with the countries in question. European airlines have for instance had to cancel flights to affected countries, often under pressure from the union representation of their employees who fear a risk of contamination. This has created not only economic problems for the countries involved but also major logistical headaches for international public health authorities attempting to manage an emergency public health response."

The consequences, he continues, go beyond health: "The effects that such events are able to create demonstrate that they carry serious risks not only in terms of human health and economic costs, but also in terms of serious social harms that can be felt both at the epicentre of the outbreak and beyond."

Naturally, concerns and fear on disease outbreaks are aired extensively on social media channels. As a TELL ME press release notes, "Social media are a fertile ground for [feelings of concern and fears], as well as for the circulation of information, be they correct, distorted or totally wrong." A TELL ME analysis report on the Ebola crisis which focused on Twitter over seven days in September showed that 632 712 tweets had been published and 17 023 hashtags using #ebola had been used.

The Ebola situation is pertinent for the research questions that TELL ME is exploring, in particular: "What are the most appropriate communication methods to deal with complexity, uncertainty, ignorance, information asymmetries, overwhelming information, biased information, misinformation and malicious information?"

The project will come to an end at the beginning of 2015. Two of the main deliverables will be an integrated, evidence based, communication work package (TELL ME Communication Kit) for outbreak communication and a prototype of a computational method for simulating the actions and interactions of autonomous decision-making entities within a virtual environment during an epidemic outbreak.

For further information, please visit:
http://www.tellmeproject.eu

Most Popular Now

Philips and Medtronic Advocacy Partnersh…

Royal Philips (NYSE: PHG, AEX: PHIA), a global leader in health technology, and Medtronic Neurovascular, a leading innovator in neurovascular therapies, today announced a strategic advocacy partnership. Delivering timely stroke...

Wearable Cameras Allow AI to Detect Medi…

A team of researchers says it has developed the first wearable camera system that, with the help of artificial intelligence (AI), detects potential errors in medication delivery. In a test whose...

New AI Tool Predicts Protein-Protein Int…

Scientists from Cleveland Clinic and Cornell University have designed a publicly-available software and web database to break down barriers to identifying key protein-protein interactions to treat with medication. The computational tool...

AI for Real-Rime, Patient-Focused Insigh…

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but still... they both have a lot of work to do to catch up to BiomedGPT. Covered recently in the prestigious journal Nature...

New Research Shows Promise and Limitatio…

Published in JAMA Network Open, a collaborative team of researchers from the University of Minnesota Medical School, Stanford University, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and the University of Virginia studied...

G-Cloud 14 Makes it Easier for NHS to Bu…

NHS organisations will be able to save valuable time and resource in the procurement of technologies that can make a significant difference to patient experience, in the latest iteration of...

Start-Ups will Once Again Have a Starrin…

11 - 14 November 2024, Düsseldorf, Germany. The finalists in the 16th Healthcare Innovation World Cup and the 13th MEDICA START-UP COMPETITION have advanced from around 550 candidates based in 62...

Hampshire Emergency Departments Digitise…

Emergency departments in three hospitals across Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust have deployed Alcidion's Miya Emergency, digitising paper processes, saving clinical teams time, automating tasks, and providing trust-wide visibility of...

MEDICA HEALTH IT FORUM: Success in Maste…

11 - 14 November 2024, Düsseldorf, Germany. How can innovations help to master the great challenges and demands with which healthcare is confronted across international borders? This central question will be...

A "Chemical ChatGPT" for New M…

Researchers from the University of Bonn have trained an AI process to predict potential active ingredients with special properties. Therefore, they derived a chemical language model - a kind of...

Siemens Healthineers co-leads EU Project…

Siemens Healthineers is joining forces with more than 20 industry and public partners, including seven leading stroke hospitals, to improve stroke management for patients all over Europe. With a total...

MEDICA and COMPAMED 2024: Shining a Ligh…

11 - 14 November 2024, Düsseldorf, Germany. Christian Grosser, Director Health & Medical Technologies, is looking forward to events getting under way: "From next Monday to Thursday, we will once again...