In the wake of the ongoing health crisis caused by the recent outbreak of the COVID-19 virus we have decided to close our office until the end of next week to ensure the health and well-being of our staff as well as our partners and donors. We are going to continue our work from home, if you need to get in contact with us just send us an email or call us (you can find our contact details here: Who are we).
We apologize for any inconvenience caused by our decision.
UPDATE (27.03.20): The NID office will remain closed for the public for the entire lock-down period. We will continue working on our projects from home. In case you need to reach us you can find our contact details here. We will keep you posted as the situation develops. Stay healthy!
For more information on the COVID-19 pandemic this is a short list of websites offering reliable information:
World Health Organization https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-detail/q-a-coronaviruses
Namibian Ministry of Health and Social Services http://www.mhss.gov.na/ | http://www.mhss.gov.na/corona
South African National Department of Health: COVID-19 Ressource Portal https://sacoronavirus.co.za/
U.S. Centre for Disease Control https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/index.html
Due to the current pandemic, there is a large amount of mis- and disinformation circulating on the internet at the moment. It is vital for every one of us to be careful what information we share on social media platforms, like WhatsApp, Facebook, and Twitter.
When encountering social media posts or messages shared on messaging apps like WhatsApp, it is important to verify the claims made before sharing this content with other people. This can be done by doing a quick google search to find the original source as verification or by looking at fact-checking websites: There is a good chance they might have already looked into the specific claim you have encountered or at least a similar one.
It is especially important to do this when those posts or messages contain screenshots, infographics etc. without citing an original source, making it difficult to assess the accuracy of the claims.
This is a list of some good fact-checking initiatives:
Namibia Fact Check Initiative (by our colleagues at IPPR Namibia) https://namibiafactcheck.org.na/
Africa Check https://africacheck.org/
AFP Fact Check https://factcheck.afp.com/ | Fact-checks on false claims circulating in African countries: https://factcheck.afp.com/fighting-myths-about-coronavirus-africa
Snopes Fact-Checking https://www.snopes.com/