BBC Media Action Feed

Media at scale during a pandemic – COVID-19 in Nigeria

2021-02-05T17:35:39+00:00

The past year has been an incredibly challenging time for journalists and programme makers across the world. I remember telling my team in Nigeria at the outset of the pandemic in February 2020 that what we communicate to our audiences may save lives.

It was a daunting and uncertain time. The Government of Nigeria responded quickly with an unprecedented “stay at home order” in several Nigerian states.

The lockdown order immediately put the livelihoods of millions of Nigerians at risk. The prices of staple goods started increasing as people across the country prepared to stay at home to curtail the spread of a disease that, at the time, had only 131 confirmed cases and two reported fatalities. For many, it was hard to understand why such action was necessary. Meanwhile, misinformation and disinformation spread across the media with many claiming that COVID-19 was not real.

Given Nigeria's population of over 200 million people, we knew trusted media and communication were critical to counter misinformation and rapidly reach people with life-saving information. BBC Media Action immediately pivoted our existing national brands, Talk Your Own in Pidgin and Mu Tattau Na in Hausa, to provide accurate health information.

But with a ban on domestic and foreign travel, we were not able to travel to our partners, or to invite some contributors to our studios for recordings. Nor were we able to invite our 130 trainees to Abuja for face-to-face trainings. Internet outages were a constant challenge when remotely interviewing contributors and our producers often stayed awake until the early hours of the morning to conduct interviews when their Internet bandwidth could maintain an uninterrupted connection.

We featured health experts and remote interviews with health workers on the front line; COVID-19 patients in isolation and those who had recovered; community leaders, religious leaders, and of course regular Nigerians across the country, providing them with a national platform to share their experiences and ask questions directly to decision-makers. We took extra care to be inclusive and give a voice to traditionally marginalised audiences who often suffer more in humanitarian crises, such as women, people living with disabilities, and older Nigerians who are particularly at risk of severe COVID-19 symptoms.

A minibus became a mobile recording studio when it was safe to meet contributors during the pandemic

We also pooled our experiences working on COVID-19 globally across BBC Media Action, and the BBC World Service. Our health advisors used these insights to develop a handbook and a series of trainings for journalists who suddenly had to become experts on COVID-19 and Lifeline communication.

And, across ten states in Nigeria, we trained and mentored 130 journalists and producers on how to responsibly communicate in a public health emergency. “I learnt to be able to generate ideas that are relevant to the moment,” reported one trainee. “I learnt the value of data, timely data, consistent data, and correct data. I learnt there is value in getting correct data.”

What is more, we did all of this whilst most of Nigeria was under lockdown. Curfews were being imposed; many were suffering from an immediate loss of income and people wanted to know where and how to receive aid.

More worryingly, misinformation and disinformation were and are still rife – our current research has shown that 55% of people still believe in one or more myths about COVID-19.

Reaching millions at a time of critical need

Following audience research conducted in December 2020, we estimated that our radio programming reached 40.6 million Nigerians, or 35% of the population, during a time of critical need. Three in five (61%) Mu Tattau Na listeners and half (49%) of Talk Your Own listeners told researchers that they did change their actions as a result of listening.

In Kaduna, a man who listens to Mu Tattau Na told us “…listeners know how the program played a vital role in creating awareness… this is what you are supposed to do before you go out, how you wear the face mask, how to wash your hands and how to practice social distancing. Again, when you have a symptom of fever, what you are expected to do”.

Another woman, also from Kaduna, told researchers “they confirm information before they air it. Also, they are sourcing the information from BBC and honestly BBC doesn’t tell lies”.

Media at scale in a pandemic

Seeing our hard work pay off and make a difference to our audiences has given us a burst of energy to drive forward into 2021 – it feels good to know those late nights and our coordinated efforts have contributed to saving lives.

But we also know that great challenges are still before us. Nigerians are experiencing fatigue with the pandemic, and are less likely to take precautions to protect themselves. This is a serious concern given that, at the time of writing, the number of daily cases is around 2,000. At the peak of the first wave, the number of cases did not exceed 900.

Misinformation and disinformation persist around the pandemic. Our research shows that 25% believe that COVID-19 is a plot to divert public money and, perhaps even more alarmingly, 16% do not believe COVID-19 is real. What is more, we also know – from research and from our own work in childhood immunisation in the north of the country - that Nigerians have mixed feelings about vaccine uptake. Research conducted by SB Intel in Nigeria reported that 40% of Nigerians would not accept a COVID-19 vaccine if given the option. With the mass roll-out of vaccines scheduled for Nigeria later in 2021, I worry that even if vaccines are made available to Nigerians, this misinformation and hesitancy will hamper the country’s ability to curb the pandemic.

With news about the vaccine everywhere, Nigerians are already forming opinions and sharing their views with others. We cannot afford to wait – our work must continue to inspire people to carry on with preventative actions, while getting in front of this challenge to ensure success in vaccine uptake. As Africa’s most populous country, and its largest economy, the health and success of the entire continent depends upon it.

Kaleem Khan is BBC Media Action's Country Director in Nigeria

The UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office support our national radio projects - Talk Your Own in Pidgin and Mu Tattau Na in Hausa. Learn more about the projects here.

Continuing the fight against COVID-19 in Ethiopia

2020-11-13T14:38:10+00:00

Amid unrest and pandemic fatigue, our Ethiopia team is working to deliver trusted information about COVID-19 as well as inspirational stories about how people are coping. Our social media producer Annis Tefferi gives us the behind-the-scenes view.

I joined BBC Media Action earlier this year as the pandemic was beginning, when we were just starting to understand the huge impact it would have on our work and on our society. Since then we have worked through a six-month national emergency, and adjusted under difficult circumstances to continue providing trusted health information in multiple languages in Addis Ababa, and in Amhara and Tigray regions.

Our work on COVID-19 is focused on three areas. The first is on the virus itself – how it is transmitted, how to protect yourself, symptoms and how and when to seek treatment, and how families and communities can best care for each other and cope in this difficult time.. We are examining the impact of COVID-19 on the lives of women and girls. And we are raising awareness about misinformation, to dispel and counter the dangerous rumours that circulate about COVID-19.

We are creating public service announcements, social media content and a new radio segment covering all these themes. We are also supporting partner radio stations in Amhara and Addis Ababa with our Lifeline training, so that they are better able to report on the pandemic, check their facts and share trusted information, and stop the spread of misinformation. Our hope is that these radio stations are better able to serve their audiences with what people need and want to know.

A man washes his hands in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Credit: Getty Images

Public interest media are essential in the pandemic to reach a wide audience with trusted information. Radio is still the most powerful format in Ethiopia, as many remote and rural communities otherwise have no access to media at all. Our support for our partner radio stations helps ensure these communities receive reliable information.

But in urban centres, Internet use is exploding, especially through mobile phones and among young audiences. We are proud that our new Facebook page, launched earlier this year, already has more than 11,000 followers, and we are working hard to make sure we can reach audiences and engage wherever they access information most.

The biggest problem we face now is that people are tired of hearing about the pandemic, and some are even beginning to forget about the importance of using face masks and physical distancing. The six-month state of emergency declared to control the virus has been lifted, although COVID-19 prevention measures remain in place and are required for people who run businesses that attract large numbers of customers.. The initial fear and panic seem to have passed. People are much more worried about their livelihoods, everyday social issues and security amidst the possibility of further unrest. It is almost as if the pandemic has been forgotten.

But we are still at risk. As of November, we have had more than 100,000 reported cases till November, although the figures may be underreported as people do not always have access to testing. In rural areas in particular, access to water is often difficult, so it can be hard to practice regular handwashing with soap.

As we pay more attention to the impact of the pandemic on people’s lives and livelihoods, and how they are coping, we continue to remind audiences across all of our outputs that COVID-19 hasn’t gone away, and that it’s still important to wash hands regularly, maintain physical distancing and wear face coverings. We constantly challenge ourselves to ensure all our stories are engaging and memorable to grab people’s attention! This is an exciting part of the job.

When we started off, we worked on a series of stories about ordinary people supporting the most vulnerable in their communities. One was about a woman who is highly vulnerable to COVID-19 because of a lung condition, and how a group of young entrepreneurs in Addis Ababa ensured she was able to stay at home while continuing to make a living by supporting her in a bead-jewellery-making enterprise. Her products were collected from her and sold online, with the proceeds returned to her to look after herself and her daughter. That was really inspiring, to see how people can support each other to get through this pandemic. I was touched by this story and to date it remains my favourite.

Filming the ride-sharing service for women, by women, in Addis Ababa. Credit: BBC Media Action

Another story that I feel strongly about is a film about a new women-led ride-sharing company, whose drivers are also all women, and how they are working to keep drivers and passengers safe. This start-up success is a positive story of women’s economic empowerment at a time that is especially difficult for women and girls, because of disruptions to education and employment, and increased risk of domestic violence.

The ultimate joy and pride for me comes from the fact that my work will provide people with information that helps them and their families and communities stay safe, while dealing with the impact of the pandemic on their everyday lives.

It has been a challenging time to work in health communication but we know that it’s important to continue. It will take help from every part of our society to control the virus and our work is helping to remind people that they need to be aware of its impact, and to continue to protect themselves as best they can.

The Lifeline communication in the COVID-19 pandemic project is funded by Global Affairs Canada and running in Ethiopia, Indonesia, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.

Handwashing with soap for health - our work in Afghanistan during COVID-19

2020-10-14T12:24:11+00:00

Nomadic people on a road north of Kabul.

In the spring of 2018, I paid a visit to a remote village of Afghanistan. As part of the villagers’ hospitality, I was served a warm cup of green tea along with some homemade cookies, and at first I was captivated by people’s stories about their culture and traditions.

Then, someone placed a large steel kettle, known in Afghanistan as a samovar, onto the fire to brew more tea. I was distracted by its NGO logo. Where did they get this samovar?

With a slight smirk, the villagers replied: “This was donated to us by an NGO for handwashing. We converted it into a samovar.”

My initial reaction was to contain my laughter at their cleverness, converting a portable sink into a samovar. But then my laughter turned into sadness at the outcome of the NGO’s efforts. They had spent so much money and effort, and in the end, their resources were not used as intended. They had not had the lasting impact they had hoped for.

I have been a humanitarian worker for the past eight years, leading various projects in providing basic water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services and working on hygiene behaviour change in Afghanistan. What I have personally observed over the years is that, despite the prolonged presence of international humanitarian organisations, many have struggled to achieve the goal of sustained hygiene behaviour change.

This is because many WASH projects focus on providing services, rather than focusing on behaviour change from the very start. They may also focus on the idea of access to water, sanitation and hygiene as being the main outcome of their work, rather than a path to other benefits.

Awareness campaigns need to explain the health benefits, and promote these ideas in a way that results in people changing how and when they wash their hands. They will not work if they impose theories that do not consider the context, or the importance of hygiene in Afghan culture, religion or tradition at the most local level.

Afghan actor Mamnoon Maqsoodi voices a handwashing PSA in our Kabul studio.

What I have observed over the years of working on hygiene behaviour change projects is that to obtain long-term impact, you must:

Make sure behaviour change is at the forefront of the project, alongside service provision
Ensure hygiene awareness campaigns and approaches are rooted in local culture, traditions, religion and norms, with the intent of changing behaviour
Give local humanitarian organisations and civil societies the autonomy to develop context-based behaviour change approaches independently, based on their knowledge on the ground
Remember that when thinking about access to services, it may mean influencing local government agencies to change policies to meet local needs, or reconsidering an agency approach and adapting to what partners find works best locally
Use the power of media as an effective platform to contribute towards sustainable impact on hygiene behaviour change.

I am now working with BBC Media Action to begin implementing a Hygiene Behaviour Change Coalition project, funded by UK Aid and Unilever, focused on changing hygiene behaviours, including encouraging handwashing with soap, to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.

The project targets two high-risk and under-served groups in Afghanistan, the urban poor and the nomadic Kuchi people. We will reach these audiences through radio and television public service announcements, and ‘fast fiction’ format storytelling rooted in local culture and tradition.

To start off this work, we have cast Mamnoon Maqsoodi, one of Afghanistan’s most famous cinema and theatre artists, to voice the first round of our TV and radio PSA campaigns. His famous voice is known to nearly all Afghan people.

We know that the majority of advertisements and PSAs use formal language and an official tone to convey their messages. We have taken a different approach, using colloquial language and a more informal tone that will resonate with our audiences.

To build our PSAs, we have undertaken a full behaviour change approach. This includes formative research, multiple workshops including the development of a theory of change, and multiple pre-tests of our content to ensure it will be effective as communication for behaviour change.

Afghan actor Mamnoon Maqsoodi washes his hands during our studio recording.

So enthusiastic was Mr Maqsoodi in embracing his character that he insisted on bringing a portable sink into the recording studio, to capture the realistic sounds and feeling of handwashing as he explained how to wash hands with soap to help fight the virus.

“This is so refreshing, to convey a message in this manner, which any Afghan will understand,” he said.

BBC Media Action will work in Afghanistan and Somalia with the Hygiene Behaviour Change Coalition until July 2021. Our aim is to focus on hygiene behaviour change that will support people to better protect themselves against COVID-19, and contribute to better health for themselves and their families. Some 80,000 children under five die each year in Afghanistan – and an estimated 12% of those are from diarrhoeal diseases, which can often be prevented with good hygiene including handwashing with soap.

It is my hope that this campaign, deeply rooted in local culture and tradition, will be the start of longer-term change in hygiene practice, and better health for some of Afghanistan’s most vulnerable people.

A tale of two crises in Nepal

2020-08-18T11:08:56+00:00

Wearing face mask and also maintaining physical distancing, Milijuli Nepali producer Prakash Sundas interviewing a woman in a quarantine centre near Kathmandu.

KATHMANDU – When a deadly earthquake hit Nepal in April 2015, survivors like me were too scared to live in our own houses, even if they were not damaged. We all moved to temporary shelters amidst a series of aftershocks.

Five years later, we find ourselves in the midst of another crisis: the COVID-19 pandemic. If the earthquake forced us to flee our houses, the pandemic has made it necessary to stay at home, and to maintain physical distancing if we step out.

After the earthquake, I had the opportunity to lead a BBC Media Action team to produce Milijuli Nepali (‘Together Nepal’) – a daily Lifeline radio programme that served local communities with lifesaving messages, initially about food, shelter and sanitation, and then about reconstruction and retrofitting.

Milijuli Nepali became an instant hit because of its unique style of delivering messages through an amalgamation of folk music and stories. After more than 1,200 episodes, broadcast through local radios in the 14 districts worst affected by the earthquake, Milijuli Nepali took a break in March 2019.

A little more than a year later, as Nepal battles against a deadly coronavirus outbreak, we've relaunched Milijuli Nepali – this time with a mission to communicate vital health messages related to COVID-19.

And I'm thrilled to have another opportunity to do what I love, and what I'm good at: using information as aid to save lives during a humanitarian crisis.

Restarting lifeline communication

When Nepal confirmed its first coronavirus case in February, fear, anxiety and uncertainty spread like wildfire, just as in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake. People had many unanswered questions about this invisible enemy that had already created a long trail of death and hardship around the world.

This situation got me thinking: I wish I could restart Milijuli Nepali so we could help people with trusted life-saving messages about COVID-19.

I then realised that I was not the only one to have thought that. I was called in for a meeting by our Country Director, Shobhana Pradhan, who had also felt the same urge to relaunch our Lifeline communication programme to save lives during the pandemic. That meeting was remarkably different from all our previous meetings at BBC Media Action. Everyone sat at least two metres away from each other, and everyone wore masks.

When a second coronavirus case was confirmed in March, Nepal announced an indefinite nationwide lockdown. The government also sealed off the long porous Nepal-India border, and all domestic and international flights were suspended indefinitely.

We rapidly realised supporting our local media partners to make Lifeline programming would need to be virtual – and started testing video conferencing for remote mentoring.

The lockdown slowed the spread of the virus in Nepal, allowing the government and hospitals to buy valuable time to better prepare for an outbreak. It also gave us time to plan how we could produce daily Lifeline content during a pandemic.

Producing this programme after the earthquake had its own challenges, but at least we could go to the field and interact with people directly. But how do we record people's voices for radio when it would be morally, ethically, and even legally wrong to meet them?

We developed our plans to produce radio content with minimum physical contact with communities, while still interacting with them as much as possible. Our plans are simple: avoid going to the field, and conduct interviews mostly over phone. Our regular production meeting also takes place virtually.

By setting up a dedicated phoneline, we've ensured people can leave us direct messages. Our voicemail has started receiving encouraging messages by people from remote and inaccessible areas, where people rely on Milijuli Nepali for health information. One recently recorded voicemail came from Ran Maya Kandel, who called us from Baglung district in Nepal's remote western hills. She told us that she eagerly waits for Milijuli Nepali as the programme delivers 'important messages in interesting ways'.

She added: "I love Milijuli Nepali because its producers talk exactly like me, or like how we village people speak."

Our work has come just in time. Since the lockdown was lifted on 21 July, coronavirus cases and COVID-19 deaths have surged. In the six months after the first case, 40 people died of COVID-19. But once the country re-opened, the death toll almost tripled in just the first month.

The second season of Milijuli Nepali is now being aired through 46 radio stations, strategically selected from across the country so everyone can listen to it, wherever they are. The timing of our relaunch could not have been any better.

Similar but different

In 2015, we named our Lifeline radio show Milijuli Nepali because we wanted the programme to motivate all the Nepali people to stand together to physically help each other in rebuilding their houses, lives and livelihoods ravaged by the earthquake.

But in 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has completely changed the idea of helping each other to survive – it now means standing together by being physically apart.

In this new season, Milijuli Nepali still sticks to its approach of communicating trusted, actionable and vital messages in simple colloquial language, but it is now inspiring people to stand together in a way that has become the new normal for the post-pandemic world.

Bhuwan Timilsina is Project Manager for BBC Media Action, Nepal

Conflict, flooding and now coping with the COVID-19 pandemic in Somalia

2020-07-31T10:19:25+00:00

As the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 increase across Africa, and the World Health Organization warns the pandemic is accelerating, we fear the novel coronavirus is spreading within and from densely populated urban areas on the continent. Rising cases in Somalia’s capital Mogadishu are especially worrying, which is already disrupted by years of conflict, and struggling to support thousands of internally displaced people (IDPs).

Recent flooding has also increased the number of internally displaced people into urban areas, creating the perfect environment for infectious disease such as acute watery diarrhoea and measles. And there are concerns that the virus will further spread, unnoticed, in congested camps.We at BBC Media Action are still working to ensure programmes and training continue to help support the most vulnerable members of society.

We’ve started this by working to ensure the safety of our staff in our Somalia office, especially production teams and contributors, without compromising our programmes’ quality or audience engagement. We provide handwashing stations, sanitizers, gloves and masks at all times, and keeping distance is also observed by everyone in the office. Most of our staff are advised to work from home, observing safety measures including avoiding public transport and visiting crowded places.

In our work, we have adapted in part by conducting remote mentoring with our partner stations throughout Somaliland and Somalia. Our production teams have adopted new formats that allow the incorporation of COVID-19 related themes in their programmes. The teams collect questions from our audiences, which are then answered by health, traditional and religious experts. Drama programmes are now examining how characters change their behaviours in light of COVID-19.

Somalis have adopted a ‘keep distance and hygiene’ slogan, ‘Hay Taban Hays Taban.’ But maintaining distance and sticking to strict hygiene rules is a huge challenge in the warm social culture of the Somali people. The traditional elders advise others to avoid traditional greetings, which include hand-shakes and embracing. They also advise newly appointed Sultans (Traditional leaders) and Agils (traditional chiefs) to avoid sipping milk from one shared pot at traditional ceremonies, as they would normally do, but rather use different containers instead.

Our programmes welcome religious leaders to give an Islamic perspective on COVID-19. They convey very encouraging messages through examples from the Holy Koran, such as how quarantine was practiced when a town was infected by cholera; those in the town remained in lockdown and those outside the town did not enter. They ask their congregations to perform ablutions at home, to pray in the mosque at a distance of 1.5m apart, and to put cloths down to avoid faces touching the carpet.

Religious leaders put more emphasis on COVID-19 in their Friday sermons and advise congregants to adhere to the WHO and Ministry of Health directives. They also dispel misinformation, amid common beliefs that COVID-19 cannot affect Muslims, or that it may be cured by spices, khat or camel milk.

Health experts are providing good preventive messages to our audiences. But we still face challenges, particularly in rural communities where it is not always understood that gloves and masks are meant for one person and one-time use.

These are difficult times for the people of Somalia, who are already suffering not only from flooding and conflict but now an outbreak of locusts. The country’s health systems have been impacted by decades of civil war, without the intensive-care hospital beds needed for a serious COVID-19 outbreak. Amid these many challenges, information can save lives: providing people with the tools to understand how to help protect themselves, and when and how to seek treatment.

Mohammed A. Gaas
Deputy Country Director for BBC Media Action in Somaliland and Somalia

How coronavirus changed media training in Sierra Leone - for good

2020-07-08T13:53:30+00:00

People all over the world are having to adapt their ways of working in the COVID-19 pandemic, and we in Sierra Leone are no exception. But working amid limited internet connectivity and inconsistent power supply makes that adaptation even more challenging.

In a way, we were lucky - as one of the last countries in the world to be hit by the novel coronavirus, COVID-19. Still, when the first cases emerged and regional travel restrictions came into force, this came as quite an adjustment to our usual ways of working.

We’d been preparing a new training course for our radio partners on communicating in health emergencies. BBC Media Action runs regular Lifeline programming training to help partners to engage with, connect and inform their audiences on health issues, should a crisis arise.

We usually run regular training sessions on communicating in health emergencies face-to-face

Suddenly, we were faced with having to deliver the whole course remotely – during a pandemic - when it mattered more than ever. BBC Media Action has vast experience in Sierra Leone of training local journalists during the Ebola epidemic of 2014-15 – but that was delivered face-to-face. We’d never done anything like this via phone and internet connection – and neither had our partners.

It was daunting to say the least. Data coverage is improving but is far from perfect in Sierra Leone, particularly in more remote and rural areas. And with regular power cuts across the country, keeping mobile phones fully charged can be harder than in other parts of the world, but we all did our best.

As most stations don’t have fixed internet, we provided all participants with mobile phone data instead. Three platforms seemed the most appropriate to deliver the training: Zoom, WhatsApp and regular phone calls. But of course, there were challenges.

Turning on videos at least to say “hi” and see everyone’s faces definitely helped to build a sense of togetherness for the Zoom sessions. Often, we had to switch to audio-only after that, to accommodate the slow connection speed. But the training was still lively, vibrant and collaborative.

When there were serious connection challenges – and there were several! – we made phone calls to complete the training modules. Flexibility and creativity were key to finding solutions for each group – but the general experience gave both us and our participants ideas for the future.

We sent audio exercises, video demos and documents – all via WhatsApp, for participants to watch, listen or read ahead of time of the sessions on Zoom.

"I can’t say that its effectiveness surpasses our usual one-on-one meetings before the epidemic, but I strongly believe it’s a unique alternative for future production meetings and training sessions," said participant Kadiatu Tholley.

Kadiatu joined us from Advocacy Radio in Port Loko, one of the 31 different stations we ran the course with over an intense three-week period. At times it was challenging, but it was very rewarding. We know our partner stations are communicating better during COVID-19 right now, sharing content to protect vulnerable groups, so that audiences can better cope and adapt to protect themselves and their families. The role media plays in health emergencies is vital.

Now we’re drawing on what we’ve learned to help adapt other critical BBC Media Action projects. Our project called ‘EAGER’ (Every Adolescent Girl Empowered and Resilient) aims for out-of-school adolescent girls to have significantly improved learning outcomes and have transitioned to education, training or employment. We support 18 partner stations across the country to produce their own local radio shows. With travel restrictions likely to continue for some time, our usual model of travelling between stations will remain on hold. But now we have learnt – and shown the stations – that remote support and co-production is not only possible, it even has benefits.

Even once travel restrictions are lifted, some of these new methods will remain – because we found that remote mentoring works. We certainly won’t stop all travel, but we will reconsider how much time we spend in the field – to develop schedules that are time-effective, cost-effective, and effective in their learning outcomes too.

The beauty of discovering this way of working is that it will allow BBC Media Action to support more stations, more often. And by helping partners create more effective programmes, we’ll be better able to engage and empower audiences on vital development issues – even after the pandemic is over.

Mariatu and Victor are Journalism mentors for BBC Media Action in Sierra Leone
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‘EAGER’ (Every Adolescent Girl Empowered and Resilient) is funded by UK AID from the UK Government – learn more here

BBC Media Action delivers Lifeline programming in many countries around the world, you can learn more about this here.

Our COVID-19 handbook for media is available here and our guide for media on communicating in health emergencies is available in 13 languages here.

Celebrating 5 years of The Tea Cup Diaries

2020-06-24T12:23:31+00:00

As our flagship peace-building radio drama, The Tea Cup Diaries, marks its fifth anniversary, learn how the show has helped bridge divides between diverse communities in Myanmar, and how it continues to support and entertain its loyal following during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The eclectic cast of The Tea Cup Diaries

A young inter-faith couple falling in love and marrying despite their parents’ concerns, an adopted daughter on a mission to discover her biological family, a journalist and filmmaker tackling fake news, and a family-run tea shop that has faced fires, economic meltdowns and now the COVID-19 pandemic – and through many other twists, turns, trials and tribulations, The Tea Cup Diaries has it all.

Since its launch in 2015, the show has reached millions of listeners across Myanmar – promoting understanding, openness, and respect for people from different ethnic and religious backgrounds. Now in its eighth series, the show continues to touch the hearts of audiences with relatable characters who reflect the country’s rich ethnic and cultural diversity, and entertaining storylines that provide a window into the different lives, experiences and beliefs of its communities. In the process, it’s garnered a following of dedicated fans – like this group of weavers from remote Kachin state, who we featured back in 2016.

The Tea Cup Diaries is unique in its timely reflection of real-life events woven into the drama’s plotlines, and the impact of COVID-19 is no exception. Our team behind the show was quick to adapt to the upheaval – from setting up home recording studios, to introducing new storylines reflecting how different characters are dealing with the pandemic.

The Tea Cup Diaries producer/presenter Ma Thet Su and her home production set up during lockdown

With the tea shop in the drama shut due to COVID-19, the characters are struggling to adapt and missing each other. Listeners follow them as they learn ways to keep themselves safe, asking each other: What are the rules? How do we keep our families safe? Are we allowed to go outside? Is there a vaccine and can local herbs cure us?

We’ve been following up each recent episode with a magazine-style programme in which we interview doctors, religious and community leaders, actors, celebrities and members of the public who have been quarantined or diagnosed with COVID-19. We talk about how their lives have changed during the pandemic – sharing diverse perspectives and fostering a sense of ‘we’re all in this together,’ regardless of ethnic or religious differences.

Since the beginning, we’ve used in-depth research to understand our audiences, explore their engagement with key communication objectives, and adjust content accordingly. The most recent findings from a panel study found that audiences were delighted to hear The Tea Cup Diaries continue to broadcast despite movement restrictions. Listeners reported learning about the ‘dos and don’ts’ of managing risks related to COVID-19 and enjoyed hearing how their favourite characters were dealing with these challenges:

“Everything is included – such as washing hands, avoiding crowds and gatherings and talking from at least six feet away” – Female, 29, Ayeyarwady

“We should respect and follow [COVID-19 advice], as it is happening all over the world. We should not be neglectful and forget. [The show] is presenting according to what is practically happening outside – it is more complete and meaningful as they warn us with storylines and drama” – Male, 58, Bago

As access to the internet expands rapidly in Myanmar, and brings with it a burgeoning population of young Facebook users, we’ve also cultivated our own digital Tea Cup Diaries community. Almost 1 million people now follow the show’s Facebook page – where we bring the themes of the show and the country’s diverse culture to life even more vividly through engaging daily video and social content. At the same time, we’ve worked to improve our followers’ digital literacy to help them navigate fake news and mis- and dis-information – all of which threaten to sow further division in the country.

The youngest Tea Cup Diaries character, James, who has grown up on the show

Five years of The Tea Cup Diaries is a truly wonderful milestone and reflects an amazing creative journey with so many talented people who have produced and supported the show over the years. We are grateful for our loyal audience who have laughed, loved, learned new things, and travelled with us to understand more about Myanmar and, of course, each other.

We are all hugely proud of what the show has achieved and look forward to what the next 5 years (hopefully!) have in store. But, for now, it’s time to celebrate and raise a glass of – you guessed it – tea!

The Tea Cup Diaries is broadcast nationally on MRTV and Myanmar Radio, and is currently funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD). Previous funders are USAID, DFID and DAI.

COVID-19: We're in the response for the long haul

2020-06-09T08:46:05+00:00

As for billions of people around the world, the past few months have been a story of adaptation and change for BBC Media Action.

We have rapidly changed how we work in ways we’d never imagined – from writing, producing and packaging an Indonesian drama series entirely from home, to setting up mobile surveys in Zambia to understand how concerns about the pandemic differ among rural and urban communities.

Our dedicated teams around the world are engaged in the rapid response to COVID-19 – providing lifesaving information to vulnerable communities and supporting local and national media partners to do the same. This has involved helping audiences understand the steps they can take to prevent transmission and minimise their exposure. It also means ensuring audiences know how to access other health and emergency services in the pandemic – including for diseases like malaria, and following heavy rains and flooding from Cyclone Amphan in Bangladesh.

We’re doing this safely by innovating new distance research methods, ensuring our production teams take clear health and safety precautions, training our partners remotely, and virtually sharing practical COVID-19 resources for media and communication professionals.

It is clear that COVID-19 is not going away any time soon. And neither are we.

Beyond providing lifesaving information in the immediate response, we know from over 20 years’ experience that media plays a vital role in connecting people in a crisis and helping audiences cope in the longer term.

Media can support audiences’ psychosocial well-being and help them feel more hopeful by connecting them with others who share their questions, feelings and worries and by providing them with a platform for constructive discussion.

We’re also working to address the longer-term impacts of COVID-19 – from our women’s empowerment project in Afghanistan tackling increased levels of gender-based violence, to a radio show in South Sudan encouraging home learning so children out of school due to lockdown don’t lose out on an education.

This pandemic has shown even more starkly the critical importance of public interest media – to inform, connect, engage and empower people. At a time when trusted information and platforms are needed more than ever, COVID-19 risks being an ‘extinction event’ for many independent media as their revenue streams collapse. We’re proud to have recently proposed a solution in partnership with Luminate: an International Fund for Public Interest Media.

I am immensely proud of our staff for their tireless dedication and hard work in the face of such unprecedented and extraordinary times.

Caroline Nursey OBE is Chief Executive Officer of BBC Media Action.

To learn more about our response to the COVID-19 pandemic, click here.

Preparing for Cyclone Amphan in the COVID-19 pandemic

2020-05-21T08:51:31+00:00

A BBC Media Action cameraman films in a COVID-19 isolation centre in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. Photo by Khandokar Hasanul Banna, BBC Media Action

Nearly a million Rohingya people still live in refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. Having survived terrible violence, they now face the dual threats of the first confirmed cases of COVID-19, and flooding and landslides from Cyclone Amphan. Here is how BBC Media Action is helping people prepare and cope.

Bangladesh is well-versed in cyclone preparation – but preparing for a cyclone in a time of global pandemic is something that perhaps no one in living memory has done before.

Cyclone Amphan has not hit Cox’s Bazar directly, but the camps have still been affected by high winds, heavy rain and flooding. And across Bangladesh, the choices have been stark: evacuate an estimated 2 million people in coastal areas into crowded shelters and risk spreading COVID-19, or continue strict physical distancing and risk more people dying in this enormous storm.

BBC Media Action’s work on preparing for natural threats like cyclones in Bangladesh dates back to 2013. We work closely with government and other agencies, using media and communication to ensure our audiences understand what to do, where to go and how to seek help before, during and after a cyclone.

In coastal areas, people are well-versed in evacuation procedures thanks in part to trusted information carried on local media – it is information that has saved lives.

But because of COVID-19, our team has had to move quickly to redesign procedures and advice to reflect the additional threats posed by the virus, and then to ensure these are communicated to people clearly so that they understand and adapt accordingly.

An infographic demonstrates how to filter and boil water so it is safe for drinking. Credit: BBC Media Action

In the aftermath of a cyclone, people need access to clean water – often requiring purification drops or tablets – as well as food, sanitation, emergency shelter and medical help. All of these procedures and practices now need to be adapted to the risk of COVID-19, so that we don’t advise people to do anything that might be harmful.

In Cox’s Bazar, with the first few cases of COVID-19 now confirmed, people are already worried. Our teams have been working hard to explain the concepts of isolation and quarantine – to show what’s inside an isolation centre, for instance, and to talk to doctors and health-care workers so that the idea of seeking medical help is less frightening. We continue to talk to the community to find out their concerns, and share these across other humanitarian agencies so they can respond and adapt to community needs.

At the same time, we’re providing information in local language about what emergency cyclone warnings mean, where and how to evacuate, and critical survival information – including water purification, hygiene practices, and avoiding waterborne diseases.

We’ve also supported health workers by producing easy to understand videos on hygiene practices in health settings and how to safely use PPE.

These are incredibly challenging times in which to work, especially when our staff are facing movement restrictions and their own challenges in keeping safe and healthy.

We’ve adapted the way we work and deliver our programming, delivering much of our support to the humanitarian sector in online sessions – covering solutions for how NGOs can continue to communicate and respond with the Rohingya population amid physical distancing restrictions.

Every second counts in a crisis. Experience and expertise in local contexts and cultures, and strong relationships with donors, NGOs, local governments and communities themselves, make all the difference in moving quickly to save lives with trusted information.

Richard Lace is the Country Director for BBC Media Action Bangladesh.

BBC Media Action has been working on COVID-19 response in Bangladesh, including Cox’s Bazar, with the support of H2H, funded through the Department for International Development.

Our work in Cox’s Bazar, where we work with Translators Without Borders and Ground Truth Solutions, is funded through EU Humanitarian Aid in partnership with Action Against Hunger; DFID through UNOPS, and UNHCR.

Broadcasting from the basement: supporting Afghan audiences during COVID-19

2020-05-19T12:26:02+00:00

Accurate and trusted information is critical to coping with the COVID-19 pandemic – especially when communities are already facing insecurity, as in Afghanistan. Find out how our flagship national TV discussion programme, Open Jirga, has adapted to life under lockdown to continue supporting audiences across the country to cope.

“How can families deal with the mental health effects related to quarantine?”

“We live in a Taliban controlled area, how can we access coronavirus testing services?”

“How can we hold a funeral for a loved one who has died from the virus?”

These are just some of the questions raised over the past few weeks during special COVID-19 broadcasts of our longstanding discussion show, Open Jirga.

Meaning ‘Open Assembly’ in Dari and Pashto – the main languages in Afghanistan – the show reaches over 6 million people across the country and is renowned for bringing citizens face-to-face with their leaders for inclusive and constructive debate. In previous episodes, audiences have raised important issues such as peace talks with the Taliban, disability rights and gender equality, including in debates with the current and former presidents.

The show’s success has always rested on its live studio audience, its ‘assembly’ of normal people who ask about issues that matter to them. But under lockdown, this is simply out of the question.

Last month, our production team set about adapting Open Jirga’s format to ensure the safety of our production crew and panellists, without compromising on the show’s ability to engage audiences and support them to hold their leaders to account.

Over two days, our team rapidly transformed the communal area in the basement of our Kabul office into a makeshift TV studio. We replaced the live audience with virtual question-gathering via video link, reduced the number of panellists from four to two, and followed safe distancing measures on set.

The first COVID-19 special, aired on 13 April, focussed on living with lockdown. Many people in rural areas aren’t observing the rules, in part due to conflicting messaging about physical distancing from health officials and religious leaders. So Open Jirga welcomed a top Islamic scholar and a senior health official to gather around an aftaba lagan, a traditional Afghan handwashing pot, to address people’s specific concerns and set the record straight with cohesive, trusted information.

Watch a clip from a recent Open Jirga broadcast on COVID-19

Since then we’ve covered practical topics, such as how and when to use facemasks, as well as discussed public access to health services for communities living in conflict zones or areas controlled by the Taliban. And, crucially, we’ve busted some of the new myths and rumours about COVID-19 emerging every day – for instance that drinking black tea, shaving your head or wearing henna can ‘cure’ the virus. We’ve also aimed to dispel the widely-held belief that the virus is mostly killing non-Muslims, which has led to complacency within some communities.

At BBC Media Action we also know from experience that media can help audiences feel more hopeful as they connect with others and hear them echo their questions, feelings and worries.

This is so important as there is also much fear and mistrust of health systems here in Afghanistan, and stigma towards people who have, or might have, COVID-19. As one virtual questioner puts it:

“People in our area do not want to opt for medical support fearing that if people learn they have COVID-19 they may be discriminated against or stigmatised by others as ‘coronavirus-affected people’.”

Enabling people to share and discuss their worries helps to break down this stigma and foster understanding, and by welcoming trusted figures on our basement broadcasts, we’re opening up important issues in a positive way – rather than leaving them to sow further division in society.

It’s strange not having our audience members with us in person, but there’s no doubt that they – and our millions of viewers across the country – are with us from a distance, in our new ‘virtual assembly’.

And while we hope for some form of normality to resume soon, even under lockdown the show must go on.

Shoaib Sharifi is Country Director for BBC Media Action Afghanistan.

Open Jirga is broadcast on BBC World Service Dari and Pashto Radio, as well as the state broadcaster Radio Television Afghanistan. It is also aired on Salam Watandar, a network of 101 FM stations across the country.

This work is currently funded by the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

COVID-19 in Iraq: How public interest media can save lives

2020-05-05T09:11:40+00:00

A pop song about protecting yourself from COVID-19 is blaring from loudspeakers in a hospital in Baghdad and has racked up over 9 million views on YouTube. The public interest broadcaster behind it, Al Mirbad, is a rare and trusted voice for news and information in Basra – read more about its vital work during the pandemic from our Iraq country director, Abir Awad.

Still from an Al Mirbad video skit about COVID-19

Iraq was just registering its first handful of COVID-19 cases when Al Mirbad’s Editor-in-Chief was approached by Dr Abbas Timmimi, Director of the Basra Health Department.

He felt warnings about the approaching pandemic were not being taken seriously enough – by the public, and also by the central government, which had not enforced border closures with Iran due to a fear of backlash from Iranian-backed militias, even though Iran was one of the worst affected countries at that time.

Al Mirbad is a household name in Iraq, renowned for providing impartial and accurate news, investigative journalism, political satire and social content to its ever-growing audiences on radio and digital media since its founding by BBC Media Action in 2005.

With 48% of adults in Basra being regular Al Mirbad consumers, and with Basra being one of the provinces worst affected by COVID-19, the broadcaster is uniquely placed to help people survive the pandemic and cope with its repercussions on daily life. And true to its reputation, Al Mirbad’s reporting from the border crossing with the Director exposed the issue and led central government to finally close the border, helping to limit further spread of the virus in Iraq.

Since then, Al Mirbad has worked closely with health officials to host a regular slot with experts, providing clear advice on a range of topics including self-isolation, how the virus spreads, and testing, as well as debunking misinformation around herbal remedies and helping to counter rumours that cause public harm. When much of the Iraqi media fell for false claims that a company in Suleimaniya has developed a cure, Al Mirbad held back, chose not to run the story, talking instead to the WHO representative in Iraq to set the record straight.

A key component of Al Mirbad’s work is producing hugely popular satirical skits intended to reach wider audiences, including those turned off by traditional news and information. Our previous research shows the skits have led to strong attitudinal change amongst audiences across Iraq, and our hope is that this trend will continue for its latest skits relaying critical information about COVID-19.

For example, this is Al Mirbad’s take on an Egyptian pop song, using new lyrics to explain the need for a lockdown and support the medical and security services. The song features Al Mirbad’s well-known actors, alongside medical teams, police and security forces in Basra. It has already exceeded 9 million views on YouTube, and has been played on loudspeakers in hospitals in Baghdad to boost morale:

The pandemic came following months of public protests against unemployment, corruption, poor services and dismay with the country’s political system. There was already boiling frustration amid large numbers of unemployed youth, many of whom had settled in makeshift tents in large protest hubs in Baghdad, Basra and other southern cities.

Al Mirbad designed another online skit to engage specifically with them – using rap to champion staying at home and encourage social responsibility. The song plays out counter-arguments to common reasons for defying curfew, such as feeling trapped, and argues that staying home is the responsible choice, rather than caving in and giving up on protester’s demands.

Al Mirbad plays a critical role in holding government to account in a country still struggling in a shaky transition to democracy. As such, Al Mirbad’s job is to be critical and challenging towards public officials. But public interest media also has a critical role to play in communicating health information in a crisis so that people can make decisions to keep themselves and their families safe and healthy. As Dr Abbas puts it:

“Without Al Mirbad and especially without Qif L-Tahshish [the social media skits] we would not have been able to reach the public with critical communications about this crisis.”

Abir Awad is the Iraq Country Director for BBC Media Action.

BBC Media Action ended its partnership with Al Mirbad in 2021, following a change in control of the organisation.

To find out more about the importance of public interest media around the world, and a proposed solution to the crisis facing independent media, read this new Feasibility Study for an International Fund for Public Interest Media.

Malaria programme tackles COVID-19 in Sierra Leone - how vital information saves lives

2020-04-24T17:51:08+00:00

People have been - understandably – very frightened by the threat of the new coronavirus COVID-19 in Sierra Leone. The country’s experience with Ebola in 2014-15 still feels very recent and its healthcare system is fragile; when the first cases of COVID-19 were announced, mis-trust and mis-information were rife, and our audiences were hungry for calm, accurate information they could trust.

Our popular Krio-language radio show, Tawa Fo Welbodi - which means ‘determined for health’— broadcasts weekly on partner radio stations around the country and is uniquely placed to help in this crisis.

Madiama is a listener of Tawa Fo Welbodi. Photo: Comic Relief

In special editions of these shows, we have focused on the novel coronavirus and provided audiences with information about what it is, how it is spread, how to protect yourself, what symptoms are, and what to do if you or someone you know develop those symptoms.

Our challenge now is to meet audiences’ needs for information about the novel coronavirus, while continuing our important focus on malaria prevention - debunking myths and increasing awareness about malaria. Half the world is still at risk from this deadly disease, which is both preventable and treatable. There were more than 200 million new cases of the disease in 2018, and a child still dies of malaria every two minutes.

Adapt, adjust and continue

As the COVID-19 pandemic dominates headlines and thoughts, we are rapidly adapting to this new context. Our radio programmes continue to emphasise the importance of early testing and early treatment for malaria, and we are providing clear, detailed information about the symptoms of malaria versus the symptoms of COVID-19. We’re also providing guidance about when to report to hospital for malaria testing, and when to self-isolate and call the emergency line.

We also know, from our research and our experience during and after the Ebola crisis, that people tend to fear and stay away from hospitals at times such as this, and may turn instead to traditional medicine. Our programmes inform audiences about measures in place at malaria treatment centres to ensure patients’ safety and protection, and remind audiences about the dangers of relying on traditional medicines instead of modern treatments for malaria. We also give updates on planned national programmes, like the next distribution of insecticide treated nets.

Our Facebook page is the most-liked page in Sierra Leone with over 500,000 followers; we are using this to post regular content from BBC Media Action's global response to COVID-19, including this animation about physical distancing and this interview on misinformation and how to identify it. We are also sharing infographics on symptoms and creating our own animations for our audiences about prevention methods.

Watch this video, produced by Comic Relief and GSK, about our Tawa Fo Welbodi project (filmed autumn 2019)

And we are sharing real stories, like this family who are taking malaria prevention more seriously than ever, to continue to emphasise the importance of protecting ourselves against malaria, especially while the country is experiencing another public health emergency.

"While you are protecting yourself from COVID-19 you should also protect yourself from malaria… it kills fast" says Vandi Magona demonstrating the steps he takes to protect his family from malaria.

Dispelling fear and mistrust

We work hard to feature local voices, such as medical experts, local leaders or well-known entertainers, that people recognise and trust to help dispel fear. For this World Malaria Day, we will share a short video on our Facebook page from popular comedian Kindo Amani, who reminds audiences that it’s still important to work to prevent malaria and to seek early treatment.

And we continue to remind our audiences who is most at risk from malaria. Antenatal visits - where pregnant women receive intermittent preventative treatment - are as important as ever, as are vaccinations for children. We inform our audiences about the continued importance of these and how people can safely access them now.

These are unprecedented times, but we will continue to produce radio and social media content that people will engage with and most importantly trust about COVID-19 and about malaria – to ensure people know how to best protect themselves and their families.

Mary Morgan is Head of Production for BBC Media Action, Sierra Leone

Learn more about our global response to COVID-19 here
Tawa Fo Welbodi is supported by Comic Relief and GSK, you can find out more about the project here.

Audience research in the time of COVID-19

2020-04-17T15:43:14+00:00

Research team observing handwashing practices in Accham, Nepal in early 2019 to inform a recent WASH project

At BBC Media Action, audiences are at the heart of everything we do. To understand our audiences and our impact, our work begins and ends with research – and this remains true even in a time of crisis.

As we respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, research helps us to understand our audiences’ perceptions and concerns relating to the disease, as well as what information they need to make decisions and keep their families safe. This in turn enables our production teams to produce trusted, clear and actionable media and communication content that reaches people – including vulnerable communities – at scale, stands out in a sea of competing information (not all of which is true or helpful), and ultimately saves lives.

But how can research teams continue their vital work when they’re working at a distance from production colleagues, when the pace of production is so fast, and when face-to-face field work is out of the question?

Adapting our pre-testing methods

It can be difficult to keep pace with the need for rapid programme development when it comes to producing COVID-19 communications content. But it’s not good enough to say ‘we don’t have time to test’. You might get a piece of content on air or online more quickly – but the impact may be lost if the tone isn’t culturally appropriate, language about physical distancing too confusing, or your call to action is not clear enough for audiences.

So our message is simple: wherever possible, ‘pre-test, pre-test, pre-test’.

There are ways of gaining quick feedback under lockdown. Whilst working from home, our research team in Myanmar recently conducted some pre-testing of one of our new COVID-19 public service announcements (PSA) with their friends and families. They found that respondents could recall the key information points from the PSA – about washing your hands and covering your face when coughing – and felt it was particularly engaging because of the traditional music and lively delivery, making it unique from more serious PSAs they had seen on other media platforms. They recommended that the production team continue with this positive, encouraging tone to engage audiences.

A scene from one of our COVID-19 public service announcements in Myanmar

Inspired by this example, our research team in Indonesia are also testing content with friends and family via telephone and social media, as well as getting back in touch with a group of young people who recently took part in qualitative research about climate change. They’re setting up closed Facebook groups through which they can pre-test content, such as short new radio dramas tackling COVID-19 misinformation and rumours, to receive rapid feedback. It’s a similar story in Afghanistan, where we’re using social media to recruit volunteers for online focus group discussions. We’re currently exploring new ways to pre-test, such as contacting respondents and playing content via mobile.

Utilising local networks and contacts

With field work limited by local restrictions on movement, we’re relying on our wide-reaching networks and contacts nurtured over the years to help us access respondents and continue our vital research – to ensure programming reflects people’s changing needs.

For example, in Zambia, we’re working closely with our national network of community journalists – developed through years of work strengthening community radio in the country – to help us understand the needs and concerns of hard-to-reach audiences. We’re looking to set up simple, safe and physically distant mobile surveys for them to run in their communities to help us understand how perceptions of, and concerns about, the pandemic differ across rural and urban areas.

Similarly, in Bangladesh, where access to Cox’s Bazar refugee camp is now restricted, our researchers are making regular phone calls to our network of Rohingya volunteers to continue taking the pulse of the community. We’re sharing the insights gained – including persistent, widely circulating COVID-19 rumours and how to counter them – through our longstanding ‘What Matters?’ bulletin in partnership with Translators Without Borders.

And in Cambodia, where our researchers had been in the midst of a panel evaluation for our popular youth project Klahan9 (Brave 9), we’re pivoting the focus of our research to include perceptions on COVID-19. The team is also exploring how to draw upon our network of Klahan9 youth ambassadors to tell us more about how they and their communities are experiencing the pandemic.

The BBC Media Action Data Portal - an open source portal containing a wealth of our existing audience research

Revisiting our existing data and building partnerships

To respect our audiences, it’s important that we use our existing insights relevant to COVID-19 and not conduct research for the sake of it.

Many of our teams around the world have been looking carefully at our wealth of existing audience research (much of which is open source and available on our website and Data Portal), re-analysing the data to draw out new insights around media access and usage among vulnerable audiences such as older people or people with disabilities. We’re also pulling out useful data from previous projects around health and hygiene – for instance, barriers to, and enablers of, good water, sanitation and hygiene practices in Nepal, Kenya and Ethiopia.

Externally, we are building relationships with organisations across key sectors (including market research, academic and humanitarian) which are producing surveys and collecting useful insights on COVID-19 – such as ACAPs, Innovations for Poverty Action, Kantar and the International Survey on Coronavirus, for information relevant to our projects.

Cross-country collaboration

Despite restrictions around freedom of movement, researchers at our London headquarters and across our network of country offices are working more closely than ever before – sharing expertise, exchanging COVID-19 research tips and tricks, and comparing cultural insights through regular calls and online forums. And we’re supporting our country offices virtually from London to better analyse their digital performance and monitor online chatter about the pandemic – using tools such as Crowdtangle’s COVID-19 tracking to help production teams fine-tune their outputs.

Encouragingly, there are early signs that our work is paying off. Some of the COVID-19 PSAs produced by our Myanmar team, for instance, are achieving record levels of online engagement. The Ministry of Health has even asked to make this PSA (watched nearly 3 million times and shared by 46,000+ people) official, for broadcast through national TV partners.

The situation is changing rapidly. But we will continue to innovate and review research methodologies to ensure we’re providing essential insights to production colleagues, and best serving our audiences.

COVID-19: Communication saves lives

2020-04-08T08:52:44+00:00

As COVID-19 spreads around the world, it is clear that trusted information is vital to help us understand what is happening and how we can protect ourselves and our families.

As with all global calamities, it will be the poorest and most marginalised who suffer most. We at BBC Media Action are engaged in the rapid response, as well as preparing for the long haul when the world will rebuild from the life-changing effects of COVID-19.

At the same time, we must keep our staff – and everyone we work with – as safe as possible. Many colleagues are working from home all around the globe and have shown great ingenuity in quickly adapting to new ways of delivering our projects. Some work – particularly in countries where connectivity is poor – can only be done hands-on, but we are following social distancing, handwashing and all the advice that we ourselves make available to others. I am grateful to all our staff for what they are doing and, particularly, to those who have decided to stay outside their home country for this period to help save lives.

BBC Media Action is working with media and communication to support the global response to this crisis in four ways:

1. Producing and sharing content that responds to the immediate information needs of millions of people around the world. This includes information about protective behaviours, symptoms, social distancing and restrictions, and dispelling the false information that is spreading along with the virus itself. This essential information is available across TV, radio and popular social media platforms. And we are making it available to other organisations including ministries of health, public health NGOs, and the media

2. Addressing the secondary health, social, economic and psychological effects of COVID-19 on communities in the developing world. Media will help communities understand what they can do about these challenges and provide a sense of shared social responsibility, reduce societal tension and encourage accountability. Our work will reflect this and, wherever we can, we will use our discussion programmes and dramas to help people rebuild their lives and livelihoods.

3. Supporting national and local media partners, NGOs and local governments to communicate effectively about COVID-19. We are doing this through distance training and mentoring to help partners develop their own content that responds to the changing information needs of the communities they serve.

4. Working to support the economic viability of independent media at a time when they are most needed. Media that operate in the interest of the public are under intense economic pressure worldwide, and the pandemic is exacerbating the financial strain. We are committed to finding diverse ways to support the commercial sustainability of public interest media.

We have been innovating in health communication and supporting communities for 21 years. At this time of crisis, we will continue to demonstrate that trusted media has the power to save lives.

Caroline Nursey OBE is Chief Executive Officer of BBC Media Action.

If you’d like to read more about our COVID-19 response and find out how you can help, click here.

The COVID-19 ‘info-demic’: A view from Bangladesh

2020-03-18T11:12:22+00:00

Rumours, mis- and dis-information about COVID-19 are spreading rapidly around the world and can be almost as harmful as the virus itself. Hear from our Senior Project Manager in Bangladesh, Kate Gunn, about the latest developments from our new global communications initiative tackling the COVID-19 ‘info-demic’.

Proper hand hygiene is key to the COVID-19 response

From working on BBC Media Action’s response to the Rohingya refugee crisis for the past 18+ months, I’ve seen firsthand how media and communication have the power to save lives.

The same is true in a health crisis. Trusted, accurate and timely information can help communities prevent or reduce the spread of disease, and guide those affected towards services and treatment.

This trusted information is needed now more than ever as countries across the world – including here in Bangladesh – take action against the COVID-19 pandemic and work to save lives.

There is so much misinformation swirling – from how the virus is transmitted, to where it has come from, to false rumours about its prevention and treatment. All of these can endanger people’s lives. I’m leading BBC Media Action’s new project, in partnership with Translators without Borders, Internews and Evidence Aid, to deliver clear, fact-based social media content to counter this ‘info-demic’.

There is a lot of content already being produced by a range of development, health and humanitarian organisations and by government departments to dispel misinformation, including the catchy Vietnamese song and animated video “Ghen Cô Vy” which has even sparked a viral TikTok dance challenge. There are many enthusiastic community-level producers too.

Still from the Vietnam Health Ministry's video "Ghen Co Vy"

But while much of this content is really good, some of it we describe as “yes, but…” efforts: mixed messages which might reinforce behaviours that risk transmission of the virus, for instance, showing people in crowds on the street, standing too close together or shaking hands.

So our challenge is not only creating content that applies to our country, our region and globally, but also working to help others do the same.

In Bangladesh, from where we’re managing the project, the situation is changing rapidly. Our main challenge is to keep our public service announcements, video clips and materials (some of which you can see here) up-to-date with official government and World Health Organization advice, and also to meet the fast-evolving concerns and needs of our audiences.

An example of the content we're producing in Bangladesh around hand hygiene and coughing/sneezing etiquette

In Cox’s Bazar, home to vast Rohingya refugee camps, and in other areas of the country where media don’t reach reliably, we usually rely on being able to share our content face-to-face with people – such as in community events and listener groups. We also know that community outreach activities strengthen what goes out on mass media, because we can discuss and interact directly with our audiences.

But, under current circumstances, there is likely to be less opportunity for that. Outreach staff will become more constrained in the level of contact they can have with communities as regulations on social distancing take hold. This is a huge challenge which also puts already vulnerable audiences at risk – imagine living in a rural community right now and facing the spread of COVID-19, with no access to any source of information about what it is or how to protect yourself.

To help address this, we’re already working to make sure that front-line staff in healthcare facilities also have access to our content and receive basic training in how to communicate it, so that communities are still getting access to that vital trusted information.

With the situation developing so quickly, it’s hard to predict what will change tomorrow – let alone next week. But with our team’s experience in humanitarian response communication, and collaboration across our BBC Media Action country offices, we are doing all we can to provide audiences with trusted, accurate and engaging content that can save lives.

Kate Gunn is Senior Project Manager in our Bangladesh office.

Our COVID-19 response work is funded by the H2H Network with the support of the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID). For more information, click here.

And if you’re a media professional seeking advice on how best to report during public health emergencies, check out our recent blog with top tips here.