San Francisco: Twitter It will no longer enforce its policy against Covid-19 misinformation, raising concerns among public health experts and social media researchers that it could have dire consequences if it discourages vaccinations and other efforts to fight the still-spreading virus.
Eagle-eyed users noticed the change Monday night, noting that a one-sentence update to Twitter’s online rules: “Effective November 23, 2022, Twitter no longer enforces the COVID-19 Misinformation Policy.”
By Tuesday, some Twitter accounts were testing new boundaries and celebrating the platform’s hands-off approach, which comes after Elon Musk bought Twitter.
“This policy was used to silence people around the world who questioned the media narrative surrounding the virus and treatment options,” tweeted Dr Simon Gould, a physician and leading researcher of COVID-19 disinformation. “Victory for free speech and medical freedom!”
Twitter’s decision to no longer remove false claims about the safety of the COVID-19 vaccine disappointed public health officials, however, who said it could lead to more false claims about the virus or the vaccine’s safety and effectiveness.
“Bad news,” tweeted epidemiologist Eric Feigl-Ding, who urged people not to flee Twitter but to continue fighting misinformation about the virus. “Stay people – don’t hand over the town square to them!”
While Twitter’s efforts to curb false claims about Covid were not perfect, the company’s decision to reverse course is an abdication of its duty to its users, said Paul Russo, dean of the Katz School of Science and Health at Yeshiva and a social media researcher. University in New York.
Russo added that it’s the latest in several recent moves by Twitter that could ultimately scare off some users and even advertisers. Some big names in the business have paused their ads on Twitter amid questions about its direction under Musk.
“The platform is 100% responsible for protecting its users from harmful content,” Russo said. “This is absolutely unacceptable.”
The virus, meanwhile, continues to spread. Nationally, new daily COVID cases averaged 38,800 as of Monday, according to data from Johns Hopkins University — far fewer than last winter but a huge undercount due to less testing and reporting. According to the most recent federal daily average, about 28,100 people were hospitalized each day with COVID and about 313 died.
Cases and deaths were higher than two weeks ago. Yet a fifth of the US population has not been vaccinated, most Americans have not received the latest boosters, and many have stopped wearing masks.
Musk, who himself has spread Covid misinformation on Twitter, has expressed interest in rolling back many of the platform’s previous rules to combat misinformation.
Last week, Musk said he would “amnesty” account holders who were kicked out of Twitter. He also reinstated the accounts of several people who had spread COVID misinformation, including Rep. Including Marjorie Taylor Green, whose personal account was suspended this year for repeatedly violating Twitter’s COVID rules.
Green’s most recent tweets include those questioning the effectiveness of masks and making baseless claims about the safety of the Covid vaccine.
Since the outbreak began, platforms such as Twitter and Facebook have struggled to respond to the flow of misinformation about the virus, its origins and its response.
Under a policy enacted in January 2020, Twitter banned false claims about COVID-19 that the platform determined could cause real-world harm. According to Twitter’s latest statistics, more than 11,000 accounts were suspended for violating the rules and nearly 100,000 pieces of content were removed from the platform.
Despite its rules prohibiting COVID misinformation, Twitter has struggled with enforcement. Posts making bogus claims about home remedies or vaccines can still be found, and it was difficult Tuesday to identify exactly how the platform’s rules might have changed.
Messages left with San Francisco-based Twitter seeking more information about its policy on COVID-19 misinformation were not immediately returned Tuesday.
A search for common terms associated with Covid misinformation on Tuesday turned up a lot of misleading content, but also helpful resources about the virus, as well as authoritative sources such as Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
White House’s COVID-19 Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha on Tuesday said that the problem of COVID-19 misinformation is much bigger than one platform and that policies restricting COVID-19 misinformation are not the best solution anyway.
Speaking at a Knight Foundation forum on Tuesday, Jha said misinformation about the virus is spreading for several reasons, including legal uncertainty about the deadly disease. Simply banning certain types of content won’t help people find good information, or feel more confident about what they’re hearing from their medical providers, he said.
“I think we all have a collective responsibility,” Jha said of fighting misinformation about COVID. “The consequences of not getting this right — of spreading that misinformation — are literally thousands of people dying needlessly.”
