Abstract
Health crisis situations generate greater attention and dependence on reliable and truthful information from citizens, especially from those organisations that represent authority on the subject, such as the World Health Organization (WHO). In times of global pandemics such as COVID-19, the WHO message “health for all” takes on great communicative importance, especially from the point of view of the prevention of the disease and recommendations for action. Therefore, any communication must be understandable and accessible by all types of people, regardless of their technology, language, culture or disability (physical or mental), according to the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), taking on special relevance for public health content. This study analysed whether the WHO is accessible in its digital version for all groups of citizens according to the widely accepted standards in the field of the Internet. The conclusion reached was that not all the information is accessible in accordance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.1, which implies that there are groups that are, to some extent, left out, especially affecting the elderly. This study can contribute to the development of proposals and suggest ways in which to improve the accessibility of health content to groups especially vulnerable in this pandemic.
Highlights
The use of the Internet has increased in the last decade, as approximately 60% of the world’s population uses this medium
The analysis shows that the World Health Organization (WHO) website is 60% compliant regarding web accessibility based on the pages analysed; at the double-A level, the figure is slightly less than a 50% level of compliance
From the point of view of the four principles (Appendix A, Table A1) that underpin the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1—Perceptible, Operable, Understandable and Robust—it can be seen that the principle that is most complied with on the WHO website is Understandable at both levels, with 64% and
Summary
The use of the Internet has increased in the last decade, as approximately 60% of the world’s population uses this medium. Has the capacity of access to the Internet increased but more and more users have access to Internet content, as a source of information. In the face of a pandemic such as COVID-19, access to reliable information by citizens is crucial as a means of preventing the disease and enabling citizens to take action in certain everyday situations, as demonstrated in a study by the European Parliament’s European Science-Media Hub [2]. In addition to the WHO, other international sources of information stand out, such as the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control and the European Commission’s
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