In the era of social media, information spreads as quickly as people click the share button on Facebook or Twitter. This includes misinformation, incorrect information reported without fact-checking, and disinformation, which is intentionally incorrect information that is designed to mislead. These false facts, the origins of which are almost impossible to identify, spread quickly from person to person, like a virus themselves. In fact, the misinformation spreading about the outbreak of the coronavirus is moving quicker than the virus itself. 

Coronaviruses, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), are a family of viruses that cause the common cold as well as more severe illnesses such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS-CoV) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS-CoV). The current strain of coronavirus, recently named COVID-19 by the WHO, originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan and the first cases were reported in late December 2019. 

Misinformation surrounding the virus appeared almost immediately. Inaccurate reports from late January claimed that the death toll in China was 112,000, when the actual number of deaths at the time was approximately 80. There have also been sensational rumors online about the source of the outbreak of the virus, leading to a viral online frenzy. An image of a woman biting a bat circulated, suggesting that the source of the virus was the consumption of bat meat– even though the picture was not even taken in China. Other theories suggested that the virus was in fact a man-made bioweapon. 

There have been so many pieces of misinformation about the virus that by mid-January Buzzfeed News created a compilation page of “falsehoods and unverified information” about the outbreak.  The Director General of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom, said, “at the WHO we’re not just battling the virus, we’re also battling the trolls and conspiracy theories that undermine our response.”

Misinformation about the virus is likely spreading because of three factors: uncertainty surrounding the validity of data coming out of China, disinformation campaigns, and the fact that, in the words of one psychologist, the virus “hits all the hot buttons” for how we, as humans, view risks.

Regarding the trustworthiness of data on infection and mortality rates, there are signs that Beijing has prevented whistleblowers from coming forward and is also underreporting cases of infection. The truth is, the validity of these rumors will likely remain unknown for years to come. What is confirmed is that a 14-day quarantine has been enforced by the Chinese government for individuals returning to Beijing from around China, and that millions of people have been quarantined in Hubei province. Further, the government has confirmed that many of the medical professionals who have been working to treat the virus have become infected, and six of them have died. Many medical professionals are now claiming that hospitals do not have enough resources to successfully treat and contain the outbreak.

Similarly, a disinformation campaign in Russia has been capitalizing on the fear of the epidemic and is blaming the United States. This echoes an old disinformation campaign from the Cold War in which the KGB claimed that HIV was a biological weapon created by the United States. This follows a modus operandi that Russia has used so often that it has been nicknamed “the Russian fire hose strategy,” which amounts to “sowing chaos and letting human nature take care of the rest.” Political motivations likely underpin this strategy, as Russia continues its disinformation campaigns in the United States in the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election.

Lastly, human beings are simply terrible at evaluating risk. COVID-19 has done a fraction of the damage of influenza, which kills about 400,000 people annually worldwide. Dr. Ann Bostrom, an expert on the psychology of human risk evaluation, says that news about COVID-19 hits “nearly every cognitive trigger we have.” This causes global anxiety and makes us easier targets for mis- and disinformation.      

“We’re hearing about the fatalities. We’re not hearing about the 98 or so per cent that are recovering from it and may have had mild cases,” said Dr. Paul Slovic, a leader in modern risk psychology at the University of Oregon. We, as humans, are conditioned by our experiences, and we have therefore come to see the regular seasonal flu as a simple fact of life. However, we are less psychologically prepared to come to terms with a flu of a different name, and this causes us to obsess over the most “threatening” and sensationalized news on the virus.

In the words of Dr. Slovic, “our feelings don’t do arithmetic very well,” leaving us vulnerable to rumors, tweets, over-exaggerated fatality reports, and misinformation spread by governments and online trolls. As of February 20, 2020, COVID-19 has caused the deaths of 2,129 people worldwide (2,118 of which have occurred on mainland China), and infected just over a dozen people in North America. 

Although we should stay clear of mis- and disinformation about the virus, we must not discount the severity of the infection. COVID-19 is a global health issue and it continues to claim more and more lives. Furthermore, the medical professionals tasked with treating and containing patients lack the resources they need to deal with the increasing rate of infections. However, the global hysteria is socially constructed and engineered. There are medical suggestions on how to avoid contracting COVID-19, but curbing the current global hysteria presents a very different challenge. Thus, it is essential for us to consider many of the claims about the virus on the Internet with a healthy dose of skepticism.