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18 thoughts on “Fox News leads the nation in COVID-19 misinformation”

  3. peterh32

    Do we know the false statements that were in the survey?

    Also re: Facebook -- Facebook is not the source of this stuff. Facebook is just where people go to talk about what they heard on Fox News.

  4. Citizen Lehew

    The right wing stuff is entirely predictable. But can we talk about MSNBC, etc? Only 39% have a grip on Covid info?!

  5. jte21

    I think the question is whether people who accept (or claim to accept) Covid misinformation think that way because they tune into Fox or Newsmax, or do they tune into Fox and Newsmax because they believe bullshit about Covid and vaccines and think it signals the proper tribal allegiance? I sort of think about all the people last year who would tune in to Andrew Cuomo's daily press briefings not because they were waiting for the latest news about the pandemic in New York, but because watching Cuomo signalled that you weren't listening to Trump advising you to inject yourself with bleach to fight the Chynuh virus.

  6. rick_jones

    From the chart:

    Number of false statements about COVID-19 that individuals believe or are unsure about

    No, not a lot of wriggle-room there...

  7. cephalopod

    https://www.kff.org/coronavirus-covid-19/poll-finding/kff-covid-19-vaccine-monitor-media-and-misinformation/

    It's a KFF survey. Here are the falsehoods they ask about:
    1. Ivermectin is safe and effective
    2. Vaccine deaths are being hidden by the govt
    3. Vaccine causes infertility
    4. Covid death numbers being artifically increased by govt by adding noncovid deaths
    5. Can get covid from the vaccine
    6. Pregnant women should not get vaccine
    7. Vaccine contains microchip
    8. Vaccine can change DNA

    Other interesting info from the survey include only 49% of Republicans trusting Fox News (they really do not trust OAN or Newsmax - local news, network news, CNN and MSNBC all do better than OAN with Republicans) and unvaccinated people pretty much dont trust any source of news.

  8. cld

    Anti-vaxxers are people who think they have a right to drive drunk and it's everyone else's responsibility to stay out of their way.

    1. Bardi

      Despite data indicating otherwise, Anti-vaxxers only think about themselves. Masks 17% effective in protecting the wearer but 85 to 90% protecting others, etc. and so on. So, thinking only of themselves, no masks and heck to others, including their "love ones".

  11. Vog46

    It's a combination of MIS-information and the novelty of the virus itself.
    But MORE importantly it's the disingenuous use of words that goes along with all of this
    For instance it's NOT natural immunity - that's a mis-nomer
    It's post infection immunity. The difference is slight but important. Some people have a natural immunity against COVID (especially the young) we should NOT be comparing them to those who have post infection immunity
    The CDC discovered that many young people do NOT develop antibodies to COVID (especially native, Alpha and Beta variants). Delta changed that due to it's excessive viral load, This is why DELTA has affected so many younger people than previous variants have.
    Also the anti-vaxxers tend to down play certain stats for their own benefit. New cases is a prime example. But new cases allow for scientists to study the evolution of the variant in question. Delta has 60 distinct variations. A new variant was found in France recently at a school. They did a partial lock down of the school and sequenced the sample and found it to be the B.1.640 variant that was thought to be confined to Africa. It has now been found in the UK, France, Africa and I believe in Germany. Will it dominate the planet? Who knows? But thats NOT the point. The point is that the virus continues along its mutational highway in MOST of the world. "But new cases are irrelevant" is the argument. No it's not irrelevant it's probably the MOST important thing TO know to see what is spreading throughout the world.
    We will get a handle on this for sure but with the winter surge happening - the Netherlands wanting to go back into a partial shut down (only applicable to the un-vaccinated) - god luck with that. But when yo look at a world map what is really concerning is that the Netherlands is mostly along the same latitude as Canada and the UK. We have places like New Mexico showing an increase in cases, which is far further south than the Netherlands are.
    Get the shot, get it as often as you can. Slow the spread.

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