Introduction:

COVID-19 created unprecedented challenges for the community and health workers; therefore, contributing to increase risk perception through training was an elementary premise in times of the pandemic.

Objective:

The research aimed at increasing the knowledge of important aspects of COVID-19 among the personnel of the Civil Defense Scientific Research Center.

Methods:

An evaluation was carried out before and after the intervention from February to April 2021. The sample consisted of 50 workers divided into two groups: 1) researchers and technicians; 2) support personnel. The research comprised three stages: diagnosis, intervention, and evaluation. A database was created with the information collected. For its analysis, the compare proportions test of responses between the groups, before and after the evaluation, was used. The percentage of knowledge appropriation was calculated with significance level (p < 0.05), and the t-Student was applied for dependent samples.

Results:

Out of 50 workers, 35 (70%) were female; 33 (66%) had a university education level. A statistically significant increase in both knowledge acquisition and appropriate questions was observed in the groups after the intervention (p < 0.05), which was higher in the support staff group.

Conclusions:

The educational intervention contributed to increasing knowledge about COVID-19 among the workers of the center, which had a favorable impact.