So many conspiracy theories on coronavirus!

ALJAZEERA:

Why are there so many conspiracy theories around the coronavirus?

COVID-19 has been accompanied by a conspiracy theory outbreak, not just on social media, on mainstream outlets, too.

by Gouri Sharma

5 Mar 2020

TWO months after China first reported a deadly outbreak of a new type of coronavirus, the topic continues to dominate headlines the world over. The virus has now infected more than 95,000 people in 79 countries and killed more than 3,200.

The disease's rapid spread has been accompanied by an outbreak of false claims and conspiracy theories on social and mainstream media, allowing misinformation on the origins of the virus and hoaxes on cures to travel as fast as the infection.

One study by the US State Department, reported on by the Washington Post, said roughly two million tweets touting conspiracy theories about the virus - such as claims it was caused by a bioweapon - had been posted outside the US over the three-week period when the disease began to spread outside China.

According to Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, head of the World Health Organization (WHO), such claims hamper the effort to fight the COVID-19 outbreak.

"At WHO, we're not just battling the virus, we're also battling the trolls and conspiracy theorists that push misinformation and undermine the outbreak response," he told reporters on February 8.

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