The need to communicate with citizens in an understandable way is of paramount importance, not only for public administrations but also for private companies. In the present article we show that the Netherlands and Germany have made considerable progress in the field of language simplification by developing a fair amount of theoretical and practical knowledge, which has given rise to a plethora of stakeholders and knowledge centres specialized in this type of communication. All these efforts are also linked to the struggle against low levels of literacy, which have an enormous negative impact on all areas of human life governed by public administration. In order to verify the level of simplified language in the Dutch and German health sector, we have analysed some examples of public information on the subject of COVID-19, which turned out to be an interesting test case for institutional communication in plain and easy language. This whole issue is very relevant for traditional translators as well, not only for the common need of getting the message across to one’s audience, but also because of the similarities of translational operations involved.