ABSTRACT
This perspective is written to give a rapid response to discuss the role of media in risk communication in the first three months of the COVID-19 pandemic. We analyze two sets of media data, China's social media and global news event, and draw a few initial observations in relation to the impacts of China's information control policy, global risk governance, and the role of WHO.
ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: Awareness and attentiveness have implications for the acceptance and adoption of disease prevention and control measures. Social media posts provide a record of the public's attention to an outbreak. To measure the attention of Chinese netizens to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a pre-established nationally representative cohort of Weibo users was searched for COVID-19-related key words in their posts. METHODS: COVID-19-related posts (N = 1101) were retrieved from a longitudinal cohort of 52 268 randomly sampled Weibo accounts (December 31, 2019-February 12, 2020). RESULTS: Attention to COVID-19 was limited prior to China openly acknowledging human-to-human transmission on January 20. Following this date, attention quickly increased and has remained high over time. Particularly high levels of social media traffic appeared around when Wuhan was first placed in quarantine (January 23-24, 8-9% of the overall posts), when a scandal associated with the Red Cross Society of China occurred (February 1, 8%), and, following the death of Dr Li Wenliang (February 6-7, 11%), one of the whistleblowers who was reprimanded by the Chinese police in early January for discussing this outbreak online. CONCLUSION: Limited early warnings represent missed opportunities to engage citizens earlier in the outbreak. Governments should more proactively communicate early warnings to the public in a transparent manner.