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  • News article
  • 17 April 2020
  • 3 min read

COVID-19 media surveillance - 17 April 2020

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

Geolocations mentioned in coronavirus media coverage showing large clusters of news reports.
Geolocations mentioned in coronavirus media coverage showing large clusters of news reports.
© European Union, 2020, EMM/MEDISYS

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

Twitter

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

  • Socially Distance This. Carnival executives knew they had a virus problem, but kept the party going (bloomberg)
  • These medical workers are tackling the coronavirus. They're also saddled with student debt (nbcnews)
  • Taiwan provides 2 million masks to Japan (nhk)
  • Early peek at data on Gilead coronavirus drug suggests patients are responding to treatment (statnews; see also hashtag #remdesivir)
  • Facebook will steer users who interact with coronavirus misinformation to WHO (politico)

The most mentioned English sources were the New York Times, the Washington Post, Fox News, NBC news and the Guardian.

Infobae, El País, CNN and RT (Spanish Version) and Le Parisien and Le Monde were among the most mentioned Spanish and French sources, respectively.

Extracted Quotes

Ursula von der Leyen (European Commission, President):

"Too many were not there on time when Italy needed a helping hand at the very beginning"; "And yes, for that it is right that Europe as a whole offers a heartfelt apology."

Chung Sye-kyun (South Korea, Prime Minister):

"The spread of COVID-19 infection has clearly slowed in April. But taking a close look, it feels like the calm before the storm"; "The number might be low, but we continue to see patients whose transmission routes are unknown, which I suspect to be transmission through those showing no symptoms".

Fact Check

Fact checked: fear mongering

  • Fact checkers debunk a video claiming to show an Italian businessman committing suicide after he lost his family to the novel coronavirus (boomlive).
  • Fact checkers debunk claims that an Indian woman drowned her children because she was unable to feed them during the lockdown (boomlive).

Fact checked: prevention

  • Fact checkers keep debunking claims about the use of garlic and hot water as protections or cures for COVID-19 (poynter).

Fact checked: conspiracy theories

  • Fact checkers continue to reiterate that there is no connection between 5G technology and the novel coronavirus (poynter).
  • Fact checkers debunk a fake quote attributed to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, according to which Bill Gates is employing COVID-19 to destabilise Africa and Africans should not wear face masks because they contain toxic substances (bbc).

Fact checked: role of fact checkers

  • Spanish fact checkers debunk claims that they are censoring private messages spread through WhatsApp - the false claims refer to WhatsApp’s decision to limit message-forwarding in an effort to stem the spread of misinformation (newtral, maldita).

Download PDF

  • 2 FEBRUARY 2022
coronavirus_media_analysis_20200417hub2.pdf

Contact

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

Related Content

Europe Media Monitor (EMM)

Medical Information System - MEDISYS

Details

Publication date
17 April 2020