Activities of Ukrainian Public Authorities to Response the COVID-19 Epidemic: Information and Security Context

Abstract

Ukraine, like most countries in the world, has faced a number of problematic issues in various spheres of public life under the coronavirus pandemic.

Ukraine is a post-communist country. Since 2014, an armed conflict has been going on in the eastern territories of Ukraine. This threatened the lives of thousands of people who were forced to flee their homes. Today there are about 1.5 million forced internal migrants in Ukraine. The coronavirus pandemic, combined with the ongoing armed conflict, could potentially lead to political instability and act as a catalyst for the economic crisis in Ukraine.

The coronavirus pandemic has raised the issue of information security for Ukraine. Manipulation of information on COVID-19 poses a security threat from destructive information and psychological influences on Ukrainian citizens.

The content analysis highlighted the dominant destructive myths about the COVID-19 epidemic, which are most prevalent in the public consciousness of Ukrainians. It is noted that the low level of information literacy of the population leads to the inability of people to ensure their own information security. The peaks of manipulative coronavirus materials growth in the media space of Ukraine were traced.

It was stated that the coronavirus pandemic has become a test of responsibility for the Ukrainian public authorities. With all the levers of influence, the Ukrainian authorities were largely unprepared to develop timely and effective mechanisms to counter the destructive information and psychological influences associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. The inefficiency of the authorities was most often manifested either in the slow response to the challenges and destructive informational and psychological threats to the COVID-19 epidemic, or in the disregard of these threats.