Coronavirus: Fake news goes viral
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 796 Ratings
🗓️ 27 February 2020
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Misinformation about the coronavirus outbreak is undermining the efforts of health officials and medical researchers to contain it.
Doctors find themselves under attack from conspiracy theorists who believe they are concealing the truth about the origin of the epidemic. Meanwhile bogus and sometimes highly dangerous advice is spreading on social media about how to protect yourself against the disease.
Ed Butler asks Cristina Tardaguila of the International Fact-Checking Network who is promoting these malign rumours. And Professor Karin Wahl-Jorgensen of the Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Culture tells him that mainstream media also bear some responsibility for stoking public hysteria.
Plus Peter Daszak, president of the US-based health research organisation EcoHealth Alliance, says one of the most worrying aspects of the conspiracy theories is that it is driving many medical researchers to stop sharing their findings.
(Picture: Viruses; Credit: wildpixel/Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi there, I'm Ed Butler. Welcome to Business Daily here on the BBC World Service. Today we're going to be asking, |
| 0:07.9 | have you heard the latest about the coronavirus? We're seeing people sharing content about how China is buying |
| 0:14.0 | cremation ovens or content about pets being killed because they supposedly transmit the virus. |
| 0:22.1 | Yes, it's all fake news and with COVID-19, it seems it's everywhere. |
| 0:26.2 | Not here, obviously. |
| 0:27.3 | But as the virus spreads, health officials say it is a growing problem. |
| 0:31.0 | We need to know what the real mortality rate, what the real ability this virus is to spread. |
| 0:35.5 | And if scientists are nervous about sharing information because they're worried about these |
| 0:39.8 | conspiracy theories targeting them, it blocks that communication. |
| 0:44.1 | Sifting fact from fiction, that's Business Daily from the BBC. |
| 1:00.6 | The sound there of a video circulating on social media reporting reporting to show policemen gunning down suspected coronavirus victims on a Chinese street. |
| 1:08.2 | In fact, it is just a montage of various unconnected footage relating to a rabid |
| 1:13.5 | dog on the loose and a motorcycle accident. It's just one of a broadening spiral, it seems, |
| 1:19.8 | of fake news around the coronavirus or COVID-19 outbreak. Christina Tadagweila is an associate |
| 1:26.0 | director of the International Fact-checking network, |
| 1:29.2 | which monitors fake news online. |
| 1:31.4 | We got falsehoods regarding the origins of the virus, |
| 1:36.3 | some people accusing the bats, some people accusing bananas, |
| 1:40.1 | some people accusing the Chinese biological weapons. |
| 1:43.7 | And then we also got some conspiracy theory. |
| 1:47.0 | People saying that was everything was Bill Gates' fault, right? |
| 1:51.0 | He was behind it all. |
... |
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