Why effective communication is key to tackle a pandemic, experts discuss

Effective communication is the heart of any co-ordinated response during a crisis.

During a health crisis, communication becomes even more significant. During a pandemic, it's not just about conveying messages to people, the approach needs to be much broader.

For instance, take India's treatment protocols, convalescent plasma therapy has been used as an experimental treatment since the outbreak of the virus. This aspect was never given enough attention in the communication and instead, plasma therapy got positioned as a go-to for COVID treatment. The ICMR has now dropped it from the treatment protocol altogether now for lack of efficacy.

It also does not help when people like yoga guru Baba Ramdev, who broadcasts on a TV channel regularly, discredit treatment protocols and mock doctors fighting on the frontline. Ramdev's Patanjali even launched a drug it initially called as a cure for COVID. None other than India's Health Minister Harsh Vardhan shared the stage with Ramdev to launch this product called Coronil. This so-called drug is still being sold but not as a treatment to COVID but as a supplement.

Vaccine hesitancy is another major concern, especially in rural areas of the country. World over, just about 5 percent of the population has been fully inoculated so far, in India, only over 3 percent have received both vaccine doses. Authorities in states like Punjab and Tamil Nadu have admitted that hesitancy among the public is large and have started efforts to reach out to people with pertinent information on the efficacy of vaccines.

Amid this backdrop, how can India improve its communication strategy against COVID-19?

With vaccine supply likely to improve only after a couple of months, what can be done in the interim to tackle the infections? To discuss this and more CNBC-TV18’s Shereen Bhan spoke to Alok Sharma, CEO of Shycocan Corporation; Piyush Pandey, Chairman - Global Creative of Ogilvy; Ajai Chowdhry, co-Founder of HCL; Dr. Arvind Singhal, Professor - Communication at University Of Texas At El Paso, and Poonam Muttreja, executive director of Population Foundation Of India.

Ajai Chowdhry said, “We are totally depending on only one way of handling COVID and preventing COVID. Rightly so the vaccine is the best way out but for us when the vaccine is just not available and also the fact that there are many variants that will keep coming around we will keep needing vaccine at the time."

"The second area very important to look at is how to use technology. So there are many technologies, simple stud if to use a great mask, but the protocol keeps changing from droplets it is gone to aerosol, and now the distance from 6 feet has gone to 12 feet so all these things will keep changing and evolving so what is needed is that we need to use technology.”

Piyush Pandey said, “There is a role of mass media but the game is much bigger than that. I see a lot of need for one-on-one communication. When we talk about vaccine hesitation, it cannot be broken by somebody saying something on television or radio, I think it needs little more persuasion."

"If governments can have workers at the village levels, political parties too, I think they have a huge role to play and I think the biggest thing is to educate them, given the very simple, precise messages. The basic job for communication is to make it simple and persuasive.”