Posing Covid’s key questions

8 May, 2020

The world, as it stands, is full of big questions without answers. Some, like “how will lockdown be eased?”, will be answered in the coming days and weeks, but others will require some real work and creative thinking. That’s where a  fascinating new call for research from UK Research and Innovation  comes in. 

The UKRI has released a neat list of 100 questions across 13 categories for “addressing and mitigating the health, social, economic, cultural and environmental impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak.” As you might expect, there are some biggies: What are the overall health impacts (mental and physical) of the measures imposed to reduce the epidemic in the UK? What role can volunteers play through the crisis, how will they behave and influence the behaviour of others, and how can they be best recruited, managed and engaged with to maximise their impact? What are the unintended consequences of releasing data and how does it influence behaviour? What will be the short-, medium- and long-term impact of the wider social changes required on, for example, crime, the legal system and education? 

We believe that there is a role for trusted brands to play in the collective effort necessary to answer these kinds of difficult questions, for the good of society but also for the business community. Brands can talk to the public in ways that research institutes struggle with, connecting with them through high-engagement channels, particularly social. So brands getting involved means that this crucial research not only gets done, but gets noticed. We will be speaking to our clients about the expertise and support that they might bring to these questions. Do you and your company have a role to play?  

By Ben Wood

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