WHO is raising coronavirus awareness globally using a WhatsApp bot developed in South Africa

One of the biggest challenges for governments, public health authorities and ordinary citizens around the world will be coping with the overwhelming amount of daily information about the scale of the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. Perhaps the key challenge is not just the volume but also being able to confidently discern between accurate and reliable sources from incorrect and misleading information. In the social media age where hundreds of millions of people around the world have a a mobile device with access to platforms including Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp, even while the world’s top scientists struggle to fully understand the scope of the pandemic, that need for trustworthy sources becomes vital, even life-saving.