The spread of coronavirus (COVID-19), which began in the Chinese region of Wuhan in December 2019, has killed more than 2,100 people, with all but 11 of those deaths in mainland China. The total number of those infected currently stands 75,700. With the spread of coronavirus, the world has seen an “infodemic” of misinformation fuelling conspiracy theories and hampering public health efforts to contain and counter the disease.
Disinformation
Public health experts have repeatedly said that non-pharmaceutical interventions are essential in managing COVID-19 because there are no licensed vaccines or coronavirus antivirals. A recent commentary in the medical journal The Lancet is just one example.
But it hasn’t stopped fake alerts and posts going viral on social media, often claiming to be from the World Health Organization (WHO) or a national health ministry, which give false suggestions that garlic, sesame oil and herbal concoctions can cure the coronavirus. Other posts even claim the virus can be transmitted by simply looking into the eyes of an infected person.
“Twitter and YouTube and other social media sites are still awash with misinformation,” said WHO spokesperson Andy Pattison, who refers to the problem as an ‘infodemic.’
“There are self-appointed experts, people working from anecdote, or making up wild claims to get traffic or notoriety,” said Pattison.
Fear-mongering misinformation about the causes of outbreak and management of the disease have also gone viral, including reports that the coronavirus was created as a bioweapon or was funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to further vaccine sales. One outlet alleged that Chinese President Xi Jinping ordered soldiers in mainland China to summarily execute citizens who refuse to cooperate with the government’s outbreak control measures.
Fighting back
Some Asian governments are fighting back with arrests, fines and laws. On January 29, five people were arrested in Malaysia for spreading fake news about the virus — one post shared are than 700 times on facebook on Facebook, falsely claiming to be from a government department, showed a fake picture of the virus and read in Malay: “This is an image of one of many ‘Allah’s armies’ sent to attack China in the form of coronavirus. This is the actual image of the virus as seen under a very powerful microscope.”
A further 11 people have been arrested in India, Thailand, Indonesia and Hong Kong. Meanwhile, Singapore has applied a four month old controversial new “fake news” law (the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act or “POFMA”) to force media outlets and social media users to carry government warnings on their posts and articles saying they contain falsehoods.
Thailand’s “anti-fake news centre”, set up last year, has been working to remove false content about the disease. Over 75% of news reports on the coronavirus outbreak making the rounds on Thai social media is fake news, the centre said on February 8. Of the 43 widely circulated news items related to the coronavirus, 33 are totally baseless and fictitious, one distorts the truth, leaving only nine that are factually reliable.
Taiwan has also warned its citizens of punishment for spreading fake news and South Korean police were working with telecoms regulators to block “false information”, according to Yonhap news agency.
Human rights groups worry that “fake news” punishments are being used to legitimise a clampdown on the freedom of speech. ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights, APHR, says countries are pursuing excessive prosecutions.
“It’s absurd, and wholly disproportionate, that people are facing a potential five-year jail term just for sharing false information online,” said Teddy Baguilat, a former congressman from the Philippines.
Singapore-based journalist and activist Kirsten Han is among those concerned by the measures. Last month, she was issued a government correction notice or sharing an article related to state executions, rather than anything to do with Coronavirus. She wrote on Twitter: “Just because there are relatively more justifiable uses of a #fakenews law, it doesn’t mean that the law was well-drafted and can’t be an instrument of abuse and oppression.”
Tech giants
Western tech giants, which have been significantly impacted by the outbreak, have stepped up their counter disinformation efforts. Earlier this month, WHO spokesperson Pattinson went to Silicon Valley for a meeting at Facebook with 20 Big Techs. One of the main issues discussed at the meeting on February 3, hosted by WHO, was tackling the spread of misinformation. Facebook Inc (FB.O) has said it would take down false information about the coronavirus, Google has started displaying information from the WHO about the virus in search results, while its video-sharing platform YouTube is promoting videos on it from credible sources. The WHO are also constantly posting on Instagram and tweeting to debunk any myths that are circulating on the platform.
“The tone is changing,” said Pattinson.
The preparations for the coordination we’re currently seeing around the coronavirus were laid two years ago, when Pattinson suggested a comprehensive effort to collaborate with social media titans to combat health misinformation to WHO general director, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. About six WHO staffers are now working on the issue in Geneva, building relationships with digital and social media sites. And it seems to be more crucial than ever.
Image credit: Olli Jalonen