The role of aerosols in the spread of the coronavirus has been investigated and discussed since the beginning of the crisis.
The journalists of EL PAÍS have written a lot about it, but no article has had as much depth as
A salon, a bar and a school
.
Twelve million readers (browsers) have consulted the news in Spanish or English, positioning it for several consecutive days as the most viewed on the web.
The newspaper will publish, next Sunday in its paper edition, the explanatory graphic in which this article is structured and makes
its direct download available to readers
.
Twelve million readers have consulted the news in Spanish or English
Javier Salas and Mariano Zafra are the architects of this report that graphically synthesizes how we can avoid contagion in closed places.
The origin of the article is in June, when Salas, editor, and Zafra, responsible for the Visual Narratives area, collaborated on another work.
They then described how the virus spreads and spreads in three different scenarios.
"It had worked very well and both of us were left with the fly behind our ears on this matter," says Salas.
So they continued to watch the evolution of the issue until Zafra read an article in EL PAÍS by José Luis Jiménez, professor of Chemistry at the University of Colorado Boulder and researcher in Environmental Sciences.
The expert warned last August of the importance of aerosols as a means of contagion.
"I saw that there was a visual opportunity and the first thing I did was write to Javi and Patricia Fernández de Lis, the Head of Matter," Zafra recalls.
The Visual Narratives team works in coordination with the other sections of the journal to identify topics with interesting graphic possibilities that facilitate the reader's understanding of complex or very extensive issues.
Presentation of the report in Javier Salas's notebook.
They were working on the article for three weeks, not neglecting other daily tasks.
The first step was to decide the focus, what they wanted to tell.
After several proposals, they concluded that the most effective thing was to focus on three common scenarios and on how sanitary measures - social distance, mask and ventilation - stop the contagion.
They came up with a layered format, in which as measurements are increased, the possibilities of contagion are eliminated.
They minimized the action of the reader in such a way that, just by doing the usual
scrolling
to continue reading, the different scenarios occur.
Zafra adds another value to the report, perhaps the one that has also made the scientific community applaud this article: "It is a correct simulation, we have not invented anything, it has the complexity of a scientific model behind it."
And it is that both professionals contacted José Luis Jiménez to use his research and the contagion patterns that he has extracted from it.
Through videoconferences they configured the scenarios, chosen based on a study by the Ministry of Health in which it warned that 40% of outbreaks originate in family gatherings.
Videoconference between José Luis Jiménez, Mariano Zafra and Javier Salas.
The story has gone viral on social networks (59% of the readers of the piece in Spanish entered through this medium) and even WhatsApp groups.
Other international media have also echoed this work, a joy for Salas, who recognizes some "frustration" at not having been able to hit "the key" before to disseminate such relevant information in this crisis.
“Many journalists and other experts had the feeling of banging against the wall because the message was not getting through and it was important;
I think that thanks to the visualization of Mariano it enters through the eyes and is easier to understand ”, explains the journalist.
Zafra adds that they have answered a question that was not only asked by citizens in Spain, but throughout the world: Why are infections increasing if we are taking measures?
"It is not worth asking for a drink at the bar to take off the mask, the graphic and the model shows it," he concludes.
This is perfect.
What a masterful piece of #aerosol communication.
This page takes all the complexity of this vitally important topic, & renders it understandable & accessible to the wider public.
It gives us all control of over what we do & * why * https: //t.co/Bec0urLOJz
- ɪᴀɴ ᴍ.
ᴍᴀᴄᴋᴀʏ, ᴘʜᴅ 🦠🤧🧬🥼🦟🧻 (@MackayIM) October 29, 2020
