Study shows role of mainstream media in fighting fake virus news

Fake news related to the pandemic is no longer focused on science and health issues.

Instead, such reports spread half-truths and confusion about government policies that were adopted to combat Covid-19. And mainstream news outlets have been shown to play an increasing role in fighting this type of misinformation.

This is according to a recent study by Nanyang Technological University (NTU) released on Monday.

The study, which received funding from the Ministry of Health, showed that in the earlier stages of the pandemic, Covid-19 misinformation related to science and health accounted for more coverage by mainstream news outlets seeking to correct it.

In the pre-outbreak stage in Singapore - defined as from Jan 1 to Jan 22 last year - about 55 per cent of the reports correcting Covid-19 misinformation were on science and health matters, while reports addressing misinformation on government policies accounted for about 11 per cent.

By the second stage of the outbreak - defined as April 5 to April 30 last year - things had changed. Reports correcting misinformation on health and science fell and made up about 9 per cent of the articles, while those on government policies rose to 42 per cent.

"This is reflective of how the Government instituted several measures in response to the outbreak, enforcing stricter measures as the crisis worsened," said the NTU researchers in a report published in the Health Communication academic journal.

But this also shows how misinformation and confusion tend to accompany such government measures, which signals the importance of immediate clarification and correction, they added.

"In this case, the findings point to the important role of the mainstream news media in helping the Government clarify and debunk wrong information about critical measures being implemented to control the outbreak," they said.

Professor May Lwin, the lead author of the study, said mainstream news media "can play a crucial role in the timely dissemination of misinformation correction, and prevent people from being hoodwinked and acting on potentially harmful misinformation".

This is due to mainstream media's social importance, wide reach and role as a credible information source to the public during uncertain times, she said.

"It is important to combat the propagation of misinformation, which can undermine key public health communication efforts and worsen the strain on public health systems," said Prof Lwin, who is also chairman of NTU's Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information.

The NTU study looked at more than 2,000 news reports by mainstream outlets here from Jan 1 to April 30 last year, focusing on 164 that covered fake Covid-19 news.

Of these, about 85 per cent were from The Straits Times, 24 per cent from CNA, 18 per cent from The New Paper, 13 per cent from Today, and less than 1 per cent from The Business Times.

The study also found that 58 per cent of fake news on government measures was addressed by news reports with complex explanations.

For misinformation on science and health, most of the reports, or about the same proportion, simply stated the claims as untrue.