The World Health Organization (WHO), the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) are working with companies telecommunications around the world to provide information related to COVID-19 and healthto people who do not have access to the Internet.
"The goal is to reach everyone with vital health messages, regardless of their level of connectivity," the WHO and ITU said in a joint statement.
“An estimated 3.6 billion people are offline, with most of these people living in low-income countries, where on average only two in ten people have access to the Internet.”
Text messaging about COVID-19 will begin in the Asia-Pacific regions and expand to people around the world.
The WHO and ITU also said that COVID-19 is the first pandemic where technology people and social media can be used on a massive scale to keep safe.
“Resilient and reliable telecommunications networks and services are essential as more countries, companies and individuals turn to digital technologies to address the impact of COVID-19,” they said.
Some countries (e.g. Australia) have already taken similar actions by sending messages providing information to people.
Additionally, last month, the WHO launched a chatbot on WhatsApp to provide information about COVID-19. The service initially only supported English, but later began supporting Arabic, French, and Spanish.
The process of chatting with the chatbot on WhatsApp is very simple. Users should message the WHO account at +41 79 475 22 09 and send the word “hi”, “hola”, “salut” or “مرحبا” to start the conversation. They can then access official information about COVID-19.
Last week, US President Donald Trump funding his nation's accusing the agency of covering up the spread of the coronavirus in the early stages of the pandemic. The move is likely to worsen conditions in the world's poorest nations.
