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Viral Infections and Outbreaks Research · Review
International Journal of Emergency Medicine · September 3, 2026
A consensus or society position rather than new primary data.
This narrative review synthesizes evidence on risk communication frameworks and recent public health emergencies to characterize systemic limitations and emerging challenges in how authorities communicate risk during crises. The review identifies that conventional messaging approaches failed during COVID-19 and other recent outbreaks, particularly regarding transparency and equity, and calls for community-engaged, equity-focused interventions in low- and middle-income settings and systematic evaluation of communication effectiveness.
Narrative review. Literature and guidance on risk communication during public health emergencies; case studies from COVID-19 pre-vaccine phase, 2022 and 2024 mpox outbreaks, and 2026 Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak. Intervention: Risk communication frameworks and strategies during public health emergencies. Global; case studies include Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda.
COVID-19 pandemic exposed substantial limitations in existing risk communication approaches, particularly regarding transparency, equity, and management of information overload Major retrospective assessments characterized the global response as a systemic failure across multiple coordinated domains, of which communication is one Frameworks remain heavily centered on high-income contexts; transparency about uncertainty is often sacrificed for the appearance of authority
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Clinicians and emergency medicine professionals should recognize that risk communication is a transversal function affecting population behavior and healthcare system burden, not an isolated function, and should advocate for equity-centered approaches and transparent uncertainty communication tailored to community contexts rather than top-down messaging.
A narrative review synthesizing frameworks, recent crisis case studies, and expert assessment of risk communication during public health emergencies, offering evidence-informed recommendations for practice and research priorities.
As stated by the source record.
Clinicians and emergency medicine professionals should recognize that risk communication is a transversal function affecting population behavior and healthcare system burden, not an isolated function, and should advocate for equity-centered approaches and transparent uncertainty communication tailored to community contexts rather than top-down messaging.
Graded across the dimensions that decide whether you should act, each from what the source actually supports. There is no single score, and where a dimension was not assessed it says so.
What is missing. This record has no reported figures. That is a gap in the analysis, not a judgement about the study.
Public health emergencies, ranging from infectious disease outbreaks to climate-driven and humanitarian crises, generate communication demands that conventional health messaging often fails to meet. Risk communication is increasingly recognized as a determinant of population behavior, healthcare system burden, and ultimately morbidity and mortality during crises. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed substantial limitations in existing approaches, particularly regarding transparency, equity, and the management of information overload, and major retrospective assessments have characterized the global response as a systemic failure across multiple coordinated domains, of which communication is one. This narrative review synthesizes evidence on risk communication during public health emergencies, based on an iterative search of MEDLINE/PubMed, Embase, Google Scholar, and grey literature from major public health agencies covering 2018 to 2026. The synthesis is organized around three axes. Established frameworks are compared, including Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication, the World Health Organization guidance on emergency risk communication, and emerging community-centered and equity-focused models, with attention to how they complement, overlap with, and diverge from one another. Lessons are then drawn from recent crises, including the pre-vaccine phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2022 and 2024 mpox outbreaks, and the 2026 Bundibugyo Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda. Persistent challenges are examined last, encompassing the infodemic, erosion of institutional trust, inequities in message reach, the dual role of digital, social, and traditional media, and the behavioral responses mediating the effects of messaging. Risk communication cannot be evaluated in isolation from the coordinated emergency response of which it forms a part, and is better understood as a transversal function serving every component of that response. Frameworks remain heavily centered on high-income contexts, transparency about uncertainty is often sacrificed for the appearance of authority, and systematic evaluation of intervention effectiveness is scarce. Emergency departments represent one important operational interface among several coordinated levels of the response rather than the sole communication setting. Future work should prioritize community-engaged interventions in low- and middle-income settings, cross-fertilization with behavioral epidemiology and public health ethics, and metrics capturing both the equity and the quality of communication outcomes.
Taken from the source record, never inferred. Follow any of these and new work involving them reaches your briefing.