Have you been confronted with rumours or misleading claims about Covid-19?
How have you dealt with them?
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From the article Resisting Covid-19 ‘fake news’ with a high dose of public trust
Yes, since more than a year I have been misled by the press
I stopped reading or believing the news years ago as a lot of it is fake, or mostly gloom and doom. Instead of saying how many are dead as a result of Covid, why not report how many have survived? More people die from other things. I keep an eye on the Government website. They should have a better idea of what is true, even if some of this is slanted in their favour, to make them look better.
At the end of the day it is 50-50 chance of the Pandemic is real or the Pandemic is fake news. So to make myself and my family safe from alleged long term health damage, I did the self-isolation, the quarantine measures and the mask wearing.No one can say which camp is right. But we can see that this is a new virus and we do not know enough to say "it is nothing".
How would I know a priori if a claim is misleading or not?
Someone could give me an answer about the number of people who die in Switzerland,one part 1600 people and another one 1900 people very near to 2000 people. what is real and what is fake.
Thousands of people die every year in Switzerland. The big question is whether they died WITH the corona virus, or FROM the corona virus. According to BAG statistics, most of those who died WITH the virus already had one or more severe health problems. Never before in history has there been so much concerted effort on the part of public health officials to obfuscate the facts and mislead the public.
What do you mean by "fake news"? This a very general term that needs clear definition.Let's look at WHO, the ones supposed to be the ultimate experts, they chaotically went from: no human to human transmission, closing borders to China is not necessary, mask is not needed, to lock everything.Was WHO spreading "fake mews"? Were they just grossly incompetent? Should we believe the horrible track record of WHO in this pandemic will improve?
A colleague from work sent me a video of a conspiracy saying it was an American man-made virus and that Bill Gates was involved, that there was a document out there somewhere proving this but it can't be found. I wrote back and said if it was American, the Chinese probably would have done everything to prove that by now, and to not listen to unproven rumours. I told her it was a virus and we need to stick with the hygiene measures to avoid a second wave. I don't think she's so convinced, unfortunately.
The Pirbright Institute in the U.K. holds patent "US 10,130,701 B2", dated November 20, 2018 for the CORONAVIRUS. This institute receives major funding from the Bill Gates Foundation. Facts, not rumors.
From my point of view the information on media not mention the social media’s gives a false picture when presenting figures on numbers of people that got covid 19 and the numbers of people died in Covid. There are no comprehensive numbers. For me the most important thing is stay to facts. How many of the people have actually died only by covid and how many have past away by an underlying illness. By not giving accurate figures makes people confused and mistrust the information we receive.
The role of the government and the authorities is to be in control of what is happening and to take the necessary steps to avoid its population to panic. The question today is: as a citizen which source of information should we believe in? I have spent a considerable amount of energy, time and effort to afford a Swiss university. I'll trust myself first.
Are you a specialist in Virology?
There are specialists in Virology on both sides of the issue, rendering your question moot.
I posted this on the fake news article. It’s worth posting here as well.The number one deterrent to this issue is education. High quality, critical thinking based education. This is typified by requiring people to substantiate a position or claim they have from a variety of positions and levels both in writing and verbally. The current approach to many topics especially in education institution is more akin to ideology or quasi religious "beliefs" than what I just outlined above. So often now people make a claim, and when asked to substantiate their position or claim they fail utterly to explain their position through even one or two levels of being asked "why" or how".A more valid claim is one that can be substantiated through multiple levels of being questioned as to "why" or "how" a person believes something.The general principle is this: The more substantial, extreme or significant your position or claim is, then the more substantial, comprehensive and rigorous your ability to substantiate your position is needed in order to be credible. If someone thinks covid-19 is fake, then ask them "why" they think that. Listen to their answer and then literally ask one more "why" or "how" and you will start to note very quickly a vague, wishy washy amount of information being used.
From our very own Federal Concil and the Head of the FOPH Mr. Koch: Masks are only useful for sick people. You wont believe it but this statement has now been ingrained into some peoples belife system. If you are a responsible person and wear your community mask in public you are actually and verbally brandished as person which is sick. Because, obviously why else are you wearing a mask?
And honestly I couldn't care less if I am branded like that. My duty is to the community, irrespective of how limited or narrow minded the citizens forming it. All these quotes and declarations have been made during the beginning of the pandemic when little was still known and panic buying was flourishing. Let's be more sensitive and take everything in the context of something that is still evolving. It would be very strange if opinions would stay the same the more we learn about how the disease behaves. And look, a simple thing about masks is that it stops breathing out particles, so I will stick to that. And washing hands. And keeping the distance.
You can also get this virus through the air as its air born, viruses are,so you can getit through your EYES also.
A good first step would be to thoroughly investigate the sources being proclaimed as "the truth" to determine whether or not they are indeed trustworthy. Initially, this must entail the creation of an independent investigative body to thoroughly probe the political and economic ties of these "official" sources - namely, key employees of the Federal Administration for Public Health, the Federal Council, the SRF, Ringier and Tamedia. On a broader scale, the investigation must include foreign bodies like the World Health Organization and the executive bodies of foreign governments and health authorities which hold significant influence. Only complete transparency can establish whether or not these sources are indeed trustworthy, or simply the tools of powerful lobbies.
RE: quote: " World Health Organization and the executive bodies of foreign governments and health authorities which hold significant influence"THE WHO has tried to coverup for China because the Head of WHo has a conflict of interest and a background of leaning towards Communism. HE should resign.governments will only act in a way to get vots.Only scientists qualified in Virology should provide advice.The Gov should use the police and army to ensure that the rules are obeyed. Citizens alighting onto a bus (787) at Riedbach in Hagenholz strasse Zurich do not all wear masks. Either no mask at all, or I have observed a man get on the bus holding a mask in his hand and spent all the time pretending to tie the strings at the back of his head. Others get on the bus at the back without masks. The driver should not let anyone on the bus without masks. Or he should hand them a mask and charge them for it, including a fine.
Sadly, expertise and transparency have little to do with the results of an investigation. Researchers are often heavily dependent on government funding, and thus are unlikely to bite the hand that feeds them. Corporate researchers are similarly dependent on corporate R&D budgets, and the pharmaceuticals are making a lot of money on covid-19.
The greatest misleading claim by far was the suggestion that wearing masks was not only unnecessary but counterproductive. This was stated by various authorities as there was a shortage of masks at the time. Anyone with the most basic ability to reason could deduce that wearing a mask should help. I once commented on this on Swissinfo and one reader suggested that I go on WHO and other health authority websites and educate myself before making comments. This was happening whilst there were pictures from all Asian countries with “everyone” wearing masks. The only defense against fake news, misinformation and manipulation is pure, simple education that instills powers of reasoning into children’s minds. There are still old school political figures who think an uneducated population was easier to manage than an educated and liberal one. Recent events have shown and proven conclusively that In the age of social media an uninformed population is hugely prone to being mislead and manipulated with dramatic consequences. Switzerland shines as a country whose population is involved, engaged and informed.
Congrats, best comment ever.
I only access official websites. If you put: coronovirus switzerland you get the official websites like BAG (Federal Health) and Swissinfo. Since March I have maintained that wearing a mask is a good way of preventing spreading but the authorities have been against wearing masks because they did not have any for the public. We were told to leave whatever masks are available for hospitals. I even put this info on website: A scientific article: To mask or not to mask: Modelling the potential for face mask use by the general public to curtail the COVID-19 pandemic by Steffen E. Eikenberry, Marina Mancuso, Enahoro Iboi, Tin Phan, Keenan Eikenberry, Yang Kuang, Eric Kostelich, Abba B. Gumel. Arizona STate University etc USA April 6. quote: Model simulations suggest that broad adoption of ... face masks may meaningfully reduce community transmission of COV-19 and decrease peak hospitalizations and deaths...... mask use decreases the effective transmission rates..... etc.
There are always experts on both sides of any contentious issue such as face masks. Some are correct, some are honestly mistaken, and some say whatever they think augurs best for their career prospects. There are plenty of studies demonstrating that masks have little or no benefit in terms of spreading respiratory diseases. On the other hand, it is well known that wearing a face mask weakens the immune system, among other deleterious effects.
Totally agree with Vera 👍
I have just a few friends in this big belief bubble. Their major news source is facebook. Sometimes I do a fact check or hoax check and give it back to them. Sometimes I find the source of a video, and extract comments from the page to show what other watches think about it. Often I link to a new source or Wikipedia. But to them, all what I say is "crooked mainstream media"!
I totally ignore them. Panic mongering, fear mongering isn't helping at all - quite the contrary. High levels of anxiety are harmful, especially for senior citizens.
Getting the virus is a major risk to your life.Spreading the virus to others is irresponsible.A threat that is more potent that the virus is IGNORANCE.The less one knows, the more he/she thinks he/she knows because there is nothing to compare the level of lack of knowledge to.
Getting the virus can be a major risk to your life only if you already have one foot in the grave. On the other hand, the seasonal flu has always been a major risk to the frail elderly. There's plenty of publicly-available statistics to prove both these claims.
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