JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

On March 11, 2020, the WHO officially declared COVID-19 a pandemic. The declaration of a pandemic posed challenges to many countries, prominent among them communication with the public to gain its cooperation. What singles out Israel's management of the COVID-19 crisis from other countries is that Israel is in the midst of a deep constitutional crisis that impacts its management of the health crisis.

Objective:

To examine the Israeli Public’s response to the Israeli government’s emergency instructions against the pandemic in terms of correlations between: (1) overall risk perceptions and crisis management, (2) overall risk perceptions and economic threat, (3) crisis management and the compliance to behavioral guidelines, (4) crisis management and economic threat, and comparisons between (1) crisis management and spokesperson credibility, and (2) crisis management and source of information credibility.

Methods:

The sample was planned using a Qualtrics XM online survey that provided the quick and effective distribution of an online questionnaire during the COVID-19 crisis. Self-selection online survey method of nonprobability sampling was used to recruit participants (n=1056) through social network posts calling on the general public (18+) to answer the survey.

Results:

Participants aged 65+ perceived higher personal risk compared to aged 18-30 (mean difference 0.33, 95% CI 0.04-0.61) and compared to aged 46-64 (mean difference 0.38, 95% CI=0.12-0.64). Significant correlations were found between: (1) overall risk perceptions and the attitudes towards crisis management (r=0.19, p<0.001), (2) overall risk perceptions and economic threat (r=0.22, p<0.001), (3) attitudes towards crisis management and the compliance to behavioral guidelines (r=0.15, p<0.001), (4) attitudes towards crisis management and economic threat (r=-0.15, p<0.001). Participants for whom the prime minister was the most credible spokesperson evaluated the crisis management significantly higher than all other groups. Significant lower evaluation of the crisis management was expressed by participants for whom infectious diseases specialists were the most credible spokespersons. Participants for whom the MOH website was the most credible source of information evaluated the crisis management higher than all other groups. Participants for whom the scientific articles were the most credible source of information, evaluated the crisis management less than those who the WHO/CDC websites or HMO/Hospital websites & HCWs were the most credible.

Conclusions:

The higher the public’s trust and evaluation of the crisis management, the more the public complies with the guidelines. It was also found that the crisis management and information cannot be approached in the same way for the whole public. Furthermore, unlike other epidemic crises, the COVID-19 crisis has widespread economic and social consequences and therefore it is impossible to communicate and focus only on the health risk without communicating the economic and social risks as well.