Osmanlliu Esli, Paquette Jesseca, Rodriguez Duarte Maria Alejandra, Bédard Sylvain, de Marcellis-Warin Nathalie, Zhegu Majlinda, Régis Catherine, Bouthillier Marie-Eve, Grenier Annie-Danielle, Lewis Paul, Pomey Marie-Pascale
Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre, Montreal, QC H4A 3J1, Canada.
Division of Pediatric Emergency Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Montreal Children's Hospital, McGill University Health Centre, Montreal, QC H4A 3J1, Canada.
J Pers Med. 2022 Apr 30;12(5):729. doi: 10.3390/jpm12050729.
Canada deployed a digital exposure notification app (COVID Alert) as a strategy to support manual contact tracing. Our aims are to (1) assess the use, knowledge, and concerns of the COVID Alert app, (2) identify predictors of app downloads, and (3) develop strategies to promote social acceptability. A 36-item questionnaire was co-designed by 12 citizens and patients partnered with 16 academic researchers and was distributed in the province of Québec, Canada, from May 27 to 28 June 2021. Of 959 respondents, 43% had downloaded the app. Messaging from government sources constituted the largest influence on app download. Infrequent social contacts and perceived app inefficacy were the main reasons not to download the app. Cybersecurity, data confidentiality, loss of privacy, and geolocation were the most frequent concerns. Nearly half of the respondents inaccurately believed that the app used geolocation. Most respondents supported citizen involvement in app development. The identified predictors for app uptake included nine characteristics. In conclusion, this project highlights four key themes on how to promote the social acceptability of such tools: (1) improved communication and explanation of key app characteristics, (2) design features that incentivize adoption, (3) inclusive socio-technical features, and (4) upstream public partnership in development and deployment.
加拿大部署了一款数字暴露通知应用程序（COVID Alert），作为支持人工接触者追踪的一项策略。我们的目标是：（1）评估COVID Alert应用程序的使用情况、认知程度和相关担忧；（2）确定应用程序下载量的预测因素；（3）制定提高社会接受度的策略。一份包含36个条目的调查问卷由12名公民和患者与16名学术研究人员共同设计，并于2021年5月27日至6月28日在加拿大魁北克省发放。在959名受访者中，43%的人下载了该应用程序。来自政府渠道的信息对应用程序下载的影响最大。社交接触不频繁和认为应用程序无效是不下载该应用程序的主要原因。网络安全、数据保密性、隐私丧失和地理位置是最常见的担忧。近一半的受访者错误地认为该应用程序使用了地理位置。大多数受访者支持公民参与应用程序开发。确定的应用程序采用预测因素包括九个特征。总之，该项目突出了关于如何提高此类工具社会接受度的四个关键主题：（1）改进对应用程序关键特征的沟通和解释；（2）激励采用的设计特点；（3）包容性的社会技术特征；（4）在开发和部署过程中的上游公共伙伴关系。
