Communication and coronavirus crisis in Spain. First lessons
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2020.may.04Keywords:
Coronavirus, Covid-19, Pandemics, Public health crisis, Health crisis, Crisis communication, Risk Communication, Institutional communication, Health, Press, Press coverage, Scientific communication.Abstract
Coronavirus crisis has caused a complicated situation at a sanitary, economic and social levels, that requires of a fundamental work in communication area so that the society comprise and collaborate with the adopted measures. Through the review and synthesis of the scientific and reference literature, the present paper contrasts lessons learnt in previous public health crisis against the communication implemented from the institutional voices and from the press coverage during the first stages of the Covid-19 outbreak in Spain. This paper detects that the absence of an early announcement (or overtaking of the negative stage) and the control messages in a context of uncertainty caused a brusque transition to the following stage of the crisis, coincident with an explosion of the number of contagions, what generated fear. The spokesperson formula applied is against all recommendations of crisis communication. Regarding the journalistic coverage, examples of alarmism and sensationalism news arised. The numeric data have been the resource more valuable and the computer graphics the multimedia content more developed. Since the pandemic is still on course, it is recommended the learning and the adjustment of the communication and information to the citizens in the following stages of this crisis or in future crisis taking into account the group of first lessons presented here.
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