How Public and Government Health Organizations can use WhatsApp to Share Critical Information About COVID-19

Senior Product Marketing Manager

Ana Butara

Senior Product Marketing Manager

Quick information from a trusted source. Ask anyone how to keep the public calm and safe during any sort of situation, and reliable delivery of critical information from trustworthy sources will be at the top of the list.

Public and government health organizations are faced with the challenge of providing information quickly and at scale during the COVID-19 pandemic. Citizens worldwide are in search of quick information from a trusted source, and reliable delivery of critical information from trustworthy sources is at the top of their list of demands. This is because the situation is changing rapidly, making this type of information more valuable than ever.

There are government websites and info numbers for people to visit and call, but there are limitations to these channels. Bottlenecks can occur on websites slowing load times, while call centers can struggle to cope with high volumes of inbound calls. This is why the public needs a fast and reliable channel to seek and receive critical information, right away.

WhatsApp and Infobip have helped health organizations solve this challenge.

How chatbots are being used to automate and quickly get accurate information to people

To provide quick and trustworthy on-demand information related to COVID19 to the public, Infobip and WhatsApp are helping healthcare organizations around the world build simple, self-service chatbots.

These chatbots are easily accessible over a publicly available number. Contact with the chatbot is initiated by anyone looking for information related COVID-19 by entering the number in their contact list and sending “Hi” to that number. This starts a dialogue with the WhatsApp chatbot, over which users can choose from a list of topics about which they would like more information.

Chatbots like this are already being used by government health organizations such as the PHE in the UK, as well as in France, Russia, Qatar, Pakistan, UAE, the Indian State Governments of Kerala, Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Delhi, and finally, in Nigeria.

Chatbots provide instant support to FAQ’s

In addition to being easily accessible and simple to use, chatbots operate 24/7 to provide critical information in an instant. WhatsApp only gives green badges to verified senders, and this ensures that the public receives healthcare information from an official health organization.

Chatbots can be an additional source for frequently asked questions about COVID-19, in the form of a virtual assistant that supports communication and public health education over mass media. Since these chatbots use WhatsApp as a delivery media, information can be expanded to include:

  • Educational videos  – how to properly wash hands, proper care for people positive for COVID-19, etc. 
  • Contacts for local health providers
  • Locations where people can get tested
  • Documents 
  • Images  
  • Links to other online resources 

If further assistance is required, chatbots can transfer the conversation to an agent for detailed answers to more complex queries.

Let us help you deliver critical information, quickly and at scale

Quick access to critical information from trusted sources is crucial in times like these, and government health organizations can provide this information quickly and easily with chatbots – and all over a robust service that already handles hundreds of millions of messages, daily.

We want to help public and government health organizations to keep the public informed and are providing free access to our platform – including WhatsApp Business API – for free.

To get free access to our omnichannel platform, talk to our experts.

Apr 3rd, 2020
3 min read
Senior Product Marketing Manager

Ana Butara

Senior Product Marketing Manager