Results and Discussion
COVID-19 related searches in Indonesia remained low in period of the
first case that was detected on December 12th 2019 (CNN, 2020) and
relatively dynamic until the first announcement of the COVID-2 first
case in Indonesia in 3rd March 2020 (Ministry of
Health, 2020). The same trend also occur globally, China and Taiwan
(Husnayain, Fuad, & Su, 2020; Strzelecki, 2020). In addition, COVID-19
related searches in Indonesia continued to extend and reached its peak
on March 16th , 2020 as local cases were reported and
local transmission was announced. The searches related to COVID-19 were
relatively high for two weeks. The searches for COVID-19 reached its
peak and continuously high for two weeks from 16thMarch to 30th March 2020, as there was an increase of
patients with positive infected COVID-19. The searches declined
gradually afterward. Such declined searches is likely due to
availability of information provided in television, online news
reporting, and social media expert reporting (Keller et al., 2019).
An increase in face masks related searches in Bahasa in line with the
increased of COVID-19 related searches (Figure 1). This reflects an
awareness to use face masks for preventing the COVID-19 spread. However,
such search also reflect a drive immense purchases of face masks that
lead to face masks shortage in Indonesia. The search was relatively high
when the first case of COVID-19 was announced and declined gradually in
the following week. However, the face masks related search increased in
the last week of March 2020. This could be due the increased number of
positive case of COVID-19. In addition, this could be due to available
information to wear cloth face coverings in public settings as
alternative rather than wearing medical face masks (CDC, 2020).
Hand hygiene is one of precaution measures to prevent the spread of
COVID-19 that include hand wash and the use of hand sanitizer. Hand
sanitizer related search was started to increase in the first week of
March 2020, while the searches for hand washing were fewer than hand
sanitizer and were relatively stable. These searches were in line with
COVID-19 and face masks related searches, expect in March
16th 2020 when hand sanitizer related search was
higher than the face mask related search. This condition indicated that
people were still gathering information about hand hygiene practices for
precaution measures when the availability of face mask was limited. In
addition, more information about to make homemade hand sanitizer were
become more popular.
Figure 2 demonstrates overall search of COVID-19 were related term was
dynamic. This is related to the public anxiety and curiosity following
the announcement of international warning from WHO. The huge number of
searches might be caused by public restlessness due to the increasing
number COVID-19 positive cases. All of the search terms that we utilised
in the study were in Bahasa. The use of keywords depict that people in
Indonesia mostly prefer to search for information related to diseases
and precaution measures in their native language. Therefore, GT data
could also reflect the information needed by users based on keyword
utilization.
We also found huge numbers of COVID-19 searches in seven provinces
including Jakarta, East Java, West Java, Central Java, Bali, Special
Province of Yogyakarta and South Sulawesi (Figure 2). Figure 2
demonstrates the search of COVID-19 increased dramatically for two days
in the selected provinces that relates to the announcement of the first
case of COVID-19 in Indonesia. Additionally, Fig.2 showed huge numbers
of COVID-19 searches in Jakarta (91 points), while in other provinces
the number was still quite low. This is due to the first case of
COVID-19 was found in Jakarta. The search decreased gradually until the
2nd weeks, however, the number of searches was
increased again in the selected province after in 3rdweek after the first confirmed case.in the seven selected provinces.
This indicate that GT data could be utilised to plan public risk
communication as well as precaution measures timely.
The study demonstrates that GT can be used as a tool to monitor public
awareness and precaution measures toward COVID-19 epidemic infection in
Indonesia couple days before and 3 weeks after the increased of
confirmed cases. Appropriate information disease and precaution measures
during outbreak is urgently needed. The provision of such information
could help the spread of disease and more importantly, could reduce
excessive amount of information circulating in affected populations
which might induce public restlessness or panic (World Health
Organization, 2020c). Thus, more effective measures to provide
information should be taken by the Government and related parties to
enhance public awareness and finally control the spread of COVID-19 in
Indonesia particularly and in the worldwide.