UAE launches survey to measure impact of COVID-19 on the country

The Ministry of Community Development (MoCD) is currently conducting an online survey to measure the impact of the novel COVID 19 on the UAE community in order to identify the social impact of this pandemic on different members of the community, and to highlight the challenges facing the society and mechanisms for dealing with them leading to the re-engineering of some initiatives and services provided by the Ministry to the community, in accordance with the social situation in the country.

The Ministry was very keen to include the largest possible segment in this survey after circulating the survey on all employees of the Federal Government through “Bayanati” platform of the Federal Authority for Government Human Resources.

The Ministry provides the online survey in both Arabic and English languages, which measures in 51 questions a set of social realities, variables and behaviours under the current circumstances, including educational level, job, number of family members, children, children at school or university, as well as senior emiratis in the family.

The survey attempts to identify what is novel coronavirus-COVID 19 from the point of view of the community, information about the virus, the extent of its prevalence and infection, whether a family member, supporting staff, relatives, friends or co-workers have been infected.

The survey also measures the satisfaction of members of the community in terms of awareness campaigns through printed, visual or social media, applying social distancing, individual movement to avoid social congestion, closure of places of recreational and entertainment areas as well as work offices, in addition to remote working for employees of the public and private sectors, and distance learning for school and university students.

The survey identifies personal precautions for virus prevention, such as constantly cleaning and sterilizing hands, wearing masks, maintaining a safe distance among people, avoid being in congested or crowded places, leaving home for necessary reasons only and following rules, precautions and restrictions and avoid being in social gatherings.

It also addresses the positive impacts of the initiatives and programs announced by the UAE to fight novel coronavirus-COVID 19 such as protecting individuals from contracting the virus, ensure family cohesion and coherence, community solidarity and rationalization consumption.

As for the aids provided for vulnerable categories in the community, the online survey asks about the extent of harm affecting vulnerable individuals, compensation for affected categories, support for small and micro enterprises and dealing with the disruption of some business projects and activities and cases of fear and insecurity.

The survey also introduces the challenges facing emirati community as a result of the novel coronavirus-COVID 19, has the government dealt wisely with the crisis? the reality of supporting education system in the community, mechanisms for employing artificial intelligence in dealing with the pandemic, providing all the needs of individuals in society, working remotely to achieve prevention, happiness and positivity in the community, as well as providing healthcare for all the society.

The survey also measures the state of happiness towards the procedures taken by the UAE government to curb novel Coronavirus-COVID 19 by identifying the point of view of the community on the government's support for individuals, implemented media and awareness campaigns, the application of social distancing, individual movement restrictions, working remotely system and distance learning and finally the proposals of the community members to fight and control novel coronavirus-COVID 19.