Usage of social media in epidemic intelligence activities in the WHO, Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean

Social media platforms are a massive source of information being used for monitoring and detecting various actual events such as natural disasters and disease outbreaks. This paper aims to present the experience of WHO, Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean in using social media for the dete...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:BMJ global health 2022-06, Vol.7 (Suppl 4), p.e008759
Main Authors: Abbas, Heidi, Tahoun, Mohamed Mostafa, Aboushady, Ahmed Taha, Khalifa, Abdelrahman, Corpuz, Aura, Nabeth, Pierre
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Coronaviruses
COVID-19
Information sources
Natural disasters
Pandemics
Practice
Public health
Social networks
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Summary:Social media platforms are a massive source of information being used for monitoring and detecting various actual events such as natural disasters and disease outbreaks. This paper aims to present the experience of WHO, Regional Office for the Eastern Mediterranean in using social media for the detection and monitoring of COVD-19 pandemic alongside the other event-based surveillance tools. Over the period of 29 January 2020 to 31 May 2021, information was collected from social media and other media outlets (web news) as being the source of health information for early detecting and monitoring the situation of COVID-19 events. Signals were categorised into new events and event updates; where event updates captured from social media were categorised into official and unofficial. A total of 10 160 COVID-19 information were captured, out of which 95.8% (n=9732) were detected through social media. None of the information captured were discarded. 50.0% (n=11) of the COVID-19 events in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) were primarily captured from social media compared with 4.5% (n=1) primarily captured from other media outlets. Almost all (99.4%) of the event updates captured from social media were official updates. Real-time, transparent and relevant information posted on different social media platforms, especially the governmental official social media accounts, strengthened the early detection and follow-up of public health events in the EMR, especially during the current COVID-19 pandemic.
ISSN:2059-7908
2059-7908
DOI:10.1136/bmjgh-2022-008759