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Abstract
The outbreak of novel COVID-19 has opened up different issues for social media including the life-endangering consequences of supposed cures, misleading rumors, and conspiracy theories about the origin of coronavirus. These dangerous rumors circulated the world and thus paired with racism and mass fearmongering all closely linked to the new “Infomedia” systems of the present century characterized by the multiplicity of means of communication between people especially platforms of social media. The sharing of misinformation has an influence beyond the harm of the coronavirus itself. Many posts were seen related to treatments that are not proven, techniques to mitigate exposure, and infection that are either not proven and/or filled with a lot of misleading information, and instruction for individuals to stock up on supplies and food. Taking into account the present situation, there is an important need to consider and assess the awareness of the public towards the dangerous impact of the spread of misinformation in the time of the COVID-19 outbreak.
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This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Article Type: Letter to Editor
EUR J ENV PUBLIC HLT, 2020, Volume 4, Issue 2, Article No: em0044
https://doi.org/10.29333/ejeph/8277
Publication date: 17 May 2020
Article Views: 5856
Article Downloads: 4730
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