Language diversity in the COVID-19 pandemic

People have a right to access the information they need during the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet often that information is not available in languages and formats they understand.

COVID-19 is rapidly expanding in linguistically diverse countries. Organizations supporting the response need to develop communication strategies that cater to the needs of marginalized language speakers in these locations. The data shown here can help organizations prioritize their use of limited resources and better prepare for multilingual communication.

The map and table (accessible through the link above) show how many languages people in each country speak, and where cases are rising fastest. These growth rates are a calculation of current cumulative cases relative to cases in that country five days ago. The growth rate calculations don’t include countries with under one hundred cumulative cases. COVID-19 data is consolidated by Johns Hopkins CSSE and updates every hour.