Coronavirus: People Are Not Believing in WhatsApp Forwards But Still Not Taking Social Distancing Seriously

A survey has revealed people feel 50-80% COVID-19 news on social media are fake.

Updated: April 5, 2020 11:46 AM IST

By India.com News Desk | Edited by Poulomi Ghosh

Nizamuddin Tablighi Jamaat
(फाइल फोटो)

New Delhi: Despite an exponential rise in the number of positive cases on Covid-19 in India, Indians are not taking social distancing seriously. Photoes and videos of public gathering, crowd at market places — all of which are avoidable — are surfacing every day exposing how lightly the situation is being taken, though death toll has reached 77.

So are they believing in WhatsApp forwards and thinking that home tricks will help them survive? A study has revealed that this is not the case. A majority of people think that 50 to 80 per cent of coronavirus-related information or news appearing on social media is ‘fake’.

Amid the lockdown, a number of people have been relying on e-papers to keep themselves updated, said the survey conducted from March 28 to April 4 among nearly 1,200 people by the Mass Communication department of Nagpur’s Rashtrasant Tukoji Maharaj University.

The respondents included students, government and private employees, businessmen, professionals and home-makers.

“To a question on fake news, 39.1 per cent respondents said 50 to 80 per cent of information on social media was false. About 10.8 per cent felt over 80 per cent information on social media was fake,” said Dr Moiz Mannan Haque, the mass communication department head who led the study.

On whether the media was ‘overplaying’ the pandemic at the cost of other important news, 34.9 per cent respondents chose to remain neutral. However, 32.7 per cent chose the ‘strongly agree’ and ‘agree’ options for this, while 32.3 per cent chose the ‘other way round’ option.

During the lockdown, the use of digital news media went up by 5.8 per cent and television viewership as the main source of news consumption went up by a little over eight per cent, he said.

The Press Council of India on Friday urged the print media to stop the publicity and advertisement of AYUSH-related claims for COVID-19 treatment in order to prevent dissemination of misleading information about AYUSH drugs and services.

In an order on Wednesday, the Ministry of Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy (AYUSH) had directed all concerned Ayurvedic, Siddha, Unani and Homoeopathic (ASU&H) Regulatory Authorities in states and union territories to stop and prevent publicity and advertisement of AYUSH-related claims for COVID-19 treatment in print, television and electronic media.

(With PTI Inputs)

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