India is relying on WhatsApp, the most popular app in the nation, to produce awareness about the coronavirus pandemic and has advised social media services to take on the spread of misinformation on their platforms.
Narendra Modi, India’s Prime Minister, stated on Saturday that residents in the country can text a WhatsApp bot– called MyGov Corona Helpdesk– to get instant authoritative answers to their coronavirus queries such as the symptoms of the viral disease and how they might look for assistance.
An individual is required to text 919013151515(or click this shortcut link) to connect to the bot.
The bot was developed by Mumbai-based company Haptik Technologies, which regional telecom giant Dependence Jio obtained in 2015, and the details is being supplied by the nation’s Ministry of Health.
” The ‘MyGov Corona Helpdesk’ has been engineered to eliminate rumors, inform the masses and bring a sense of calm to the existing chaos-like circumstance. We are dedicated to helping the government with all our possible strengths and resources and hope that this chatbot can help the GoI spread the ideal details across the nation,” Aakrit Vaish, co-founder and president of Haptik, told TechCrunch.
A screenshot of New Delhi’s WhatsApp bot
On Thursday, Modi prompted the country’s 1.3 billion citizens to remain at house as much as possible for the next couple of days to prevent any “surge” of coronavirus cases.
” For the last few days we have seen that people think we are safe from coronavirus. This is not. It’s not fine to get contented,” he stated in a nationwide televised appearance.
More than 250 people have actually evaluated favorable for COVID-19 in India up until now.
On Friday, India’s IT ministry provided an advisory to social networks giants including Facebook, ByteDance, Twitter, and Sharechat, to take immediate actions to eliminate or disable phony material around coronavirus.
” Intermediaries are urged to start awareness campaign on their platforms for the users not to publish/ circulate any incorrect news/misinformation concerning coronavirus which are most likely to produce panic amongst public and disturb the general public order and social harmony,” it stated.
Earlier today, the World Health Company partnered with WhatsApp to create a helpline to provide people with accurate health information associated to the coronavirus.
The WHO Health Alert provides tips on how people could safeguard themselves, the latest news updates and findings on the pandemic, and answers to some of the often asked concerns. Individuals can sign up to this bot by clicking here
In a declaration, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of WHO, stated, “digital innovation gives us an extraordinary opportunity for important health information to go viral and spread quicker than the pandemic, helping us save lives and protect the susceptible. We are happy to have partners like Facebook and Whatsapp, that are supporting us in reaching billions of people with important health details.”
WhatsApp, which has been facing spread of reports about the pandemic, started reaching out to dozens of governments last month to assist in their efforts to provide precise info to the public, it stated.
” As part of our effort to make sure everyone has precise and timely information about coronavirus, we’re dealing with the Indian government and nationwide federal governments all over the world,” said Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive of Facebook.
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