Previously submitted to: JMIR Public Health and Surveillance (no longer under consideration since Mar 29, 2020)
Date Submitted: Mar 29, 2020
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Fake News and Social Media about SARS-CoV-2: Insights from Peru
ABSTRACT
Fake news has become a common practice in recent years, which is facilitated by the overwhelming use of social media by the general public. This viewpoint paper aims to analyze a selection of fake news disseminated in Peru about SARS-CoV-2 and we propose specific strategies to deal with it. In the current SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the need for providing official and timely information is key in the control and management of the COVID-19 disease. However, health authorities are struggling not only with providing proper patients’ care, but also dealing with appropriate risk communication given the massive spread of misinformation and fake news. Inadequate health literacy and lack of digital health literacy skills might worsen the problem. There is an urgent need to build capacity in schools and promote trusted sources in Peru and to educate on digital health literacy to combat misinformation from social media venues.
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