COVID-19 media surveillance - 11 March 2021

This media surveillance collects articles reported through publicly available web sites.

It is created with the Europe Media Monitor (EMM).

The selection and placement of stories are determined automatically by a computer program.

Headlines

• US: President Biden signed 1.9 trillion USD COVID-19 relief bill; 2020 deadliest year in the US in more than a century, early CDC data indicate
• EU has exported 34 million doses including 9 million to UK; 'no indication' AstraZeneca vaccine linked to blood clots according to EMA; one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine approved by EMA
• Brazil: experts issue warning as hospitals 'close to collapse'
• Spain’s regions agree to restrict travel over Easter week, but Madrid rejects measure
• Portugal to keep land border with Spain shut, travel restrictions stay in place
• France eases travel restrictions for UK and six other countries; Paris hospitals near capacity as severe Covid-19 cases surge;
• Ireland: three stillbirths confirmed to have been caused by Covid-19
• Germany is experiencing its third wave according to Robert-Koch-Institute
• Denmark, Norway and Iceland suspend AstraZeneca COVID shots after blood clot reports
• Belgium continues to use AstraZeneca vaccine
• Italy: further restrictions expected as infection rate rises again
• Poland adds two provinces to stricter lockdown regime
• Luxembourg: preliminary investigation into unjustified cases of VIP vaccinations likely to be opened
• Slovakia health minister resigns over Russian vaccine controversy
• Israel: Pfizer-BioNTech Covid vaccine blocks most spread in Israeli study
• India: 86% of India's new Covid-19 cases from 6 states - Maharashtra, Kerala, Punjab, Karnataka, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu
• New Zealand reported no new community cases and 6 imported cases in managed isolation
• China has launched a digital health certificate program for vaccinated travelers
• Japan: Infections of virus variants quadruple within a month

Twitter

The following news were found among the most mentioned/retweeted items:

• "Austria suspends AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine batch after death" (reuters)
• "UK COVID-19 variant has significantly higher death rate, study finds" (reuters)
• "In 2018, diplomats warned of risky coronavirus experiments in a Wuhan lab. No one listened. After seeing a risky lab, they wrote a cable warning to Washington. But it was ignored." (politico)
• "Hospital waiting lists in England hit new high after January's coronavirus peak" (skynews)

The most mentioned English sources were the New York Times, AP news, Reuters and CNN.

El Confidencial, Clarin and Latinus, and Francetvinfo and 20minutes were among the most mentioned Spanish and French sources, respectively.

Misinformation

442 articles from unverified sources were selected forming 10 supernarratives over the last week:

Fact Check

• Fact checkers debunk a Facebook post claiming that COVID-19 vaccines contain aluminium, mercury, mouse brains, the xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related (XMRV) virus and human blood (fullfact).
• UK fact checkers debunk claims that government data shows 460 deaths and 243,612 injuries from COVID-19 vaccines in the UK, reporting that deaths and other “injuries” may occur after someone has had a vaccine, but this does not mean they were caused by the vaccine (fullfact).
• Similarly, US fact checkers address a report by the far-right news outlet The Epoch Times claiming that, on 6 March, 966 people died after having the Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccines. Fact checkers note that there are hundreds of reports of people having died after getting a COVID-19 vaccine, but that does not necessarily mean the vaccine was the cause (newsweek).

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Contact

Mail to JRC-EMM-SUPPORTec [dot] europa [dot] eu (subject: COVID-19%20media%20surveillance) (JRC-EMM-SUPPORT[at]ec[dot]europa[dot]eu)

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