Affiliations: [a] Department of Computer Engineering, MPSTME, NMIMS University, Mumbai, India | [b] Department of Computer Sciences and Engineering (Data Science), ABES Engineering College, Ghaziabad, India
Correspondence:
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Corresponding author: Diksha Dani, Department of Computer Engineering, MPSTME, NMIMS University, Mumbai, India. E-mail: dikshadani@yahoo.com.
Abstract: BACKGROUND: The recent COVID-19 pandemic like situation has killed a large numbers of people and caused havoc across the world. With the aim of providing the COVID-19 related updated information about facilities, availability, utilization of COVID-19 related resources like vaccines, hospitals, beds, oxygen to the people and preventing its surge, many websites were developed for health guidance to the general masses. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this paper is to investigate the accessibility and usability of websites providing COVID-19 information in India. METHODS: This study evaluates the 38 websites providing COVID-19 information in India using automated tools. RESULTS: It was found that digital healthcare information is far from accessibility conformance and none of the websites conformed to web content accessibility guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 completely. The website adhered to understandability with average errors of 2.8 while less compliant to perceivability with average errors of 30.5. It was also found that most of the websites were mobile friendly.
Keywords: Web accessibility, COVID-19, healthcare, WCAG 2.0, performance, usability
