Talk:COVID-19 misinformation

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the COVID-19 misinformation article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Article policies Neutral point of view No original research Verifiability

Find medical sources: Source guidelines · PubMed · Cochrane · DOAJ · Gale · OpenMD · ScienceDirect · Springer · Trip · Wiley · TWL

Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14Auto-archiving period: 21 days

The contentious topics procedure applies to this page. This page is related to COVID-19, broadly construed, which is a contentious topic. Please consult the procedures and edit carefully.

There have been attempts to recruit editors of specific viewpoints to this article, in a manner that does not comply with Wikipedia's policies. Editors are encouraged to use neutral mechanisms for requesting outside input (e.g. a "request for comment", a third opinion or other noticeboard post, or neutral criteria: "pinging all editors who have edited this page in the last 48 hours"). If someone has asked you to provide your opinion here, examine the arguments, not the editors who have made them. Reminder: disputes are resolved by consensus, not by majority vote.

The subject of this article is controversial and content may be in dispute. When updating the article, be bold, but not reckless. Feel free to try to improve the article, but don't take it personally if your changes are reversed; instead, come here to the talk page to discuss them. Content must be written from a neutral point of view. Include citations when adding content and consider tagging or removing unsourced information.

WikiProject COVID-19 consensus WikiProject COVID-19 aims to add to and build consensus for pages relating to COVID-19. They have so far discussed items listed below. Please discuss proposed improvements to them at the project talk page. General Superseded by TfD October 2020 and later practice - consult regular {{Current}} guidance. Refrain from using Worldometer (worldometers.info) as a source due to common errors being observed as noted on the Case Count Task Force common errors page. (April 2020, April 2020) For infoboxes on the main articles of countries, use Wuhan, Hubei, China for the origin parameter. (March 2020) "Social distancing" is generally preferred over "physical distancing". (April 2020, May 2020) Page title COVID-19 (full caps) is preferable in the body of all articles, and in the title of all articles/category pages/etc.(RM April 2020, including the main article itself, RM March 2021). SARS-CoV-2 (exact capitalisation and punctuation) is the common name of the virus and should be used for the main article's title, as well as in the body of all articles, and in the title of all other articles/category pages/etc. (June 2022, overturning April 2020) Map There is no consensus about which color schemes to use, but they should be consistent within articles as much as possible. There is agreement that there should be six levels of shading, plus gray   for areas with no instances or no data. (May 2020) There is no consensus about whether the legend, the date, and other elements should appear in the map image itself. (May 2020) For map legends, ranges should use fixed round numbers (as opposed to updating dynamically). There is no consensus on what base population to use for per capita maps. (May 2020) To ensure you are viewing the current list, you may wish to purge this page.

This article is written in American English, which has its own spelling conventions (color, defense, traveled) and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

Other talk page banners

This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. It is of interest to multiple WikiProjects. COVID-19 Top‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject COVID-19, a project to coordinate efforts to improve all COVID-19-related articles. If you would like to help, you are invited to join and to participate in project discussions.COVID-19Wikipedia:WikiProject COVID-19Template:WikiProject COVID-19COVID-19 articles Top This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale. Disaster management High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Disaster management, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Disaster management on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Disaster managementWikipedia:WikiProject Disaster managementTemplate:WikiProject Disaster managementDisaster management articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Medicine: Society / Pulmonology Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Medicine, which recommends that medicine-related articles follow the Manual of Style for medicine-related articles and that biomedical information in any article use high-quality medical sources. Please visit the project page for details or ask questions at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Medicine.MedicineWikipedia:WikiProject MedicineTemplate:WikiProject Medicinemedicine articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. This article is supported by the Society and Medicine task force (assessed as High-importance). This article is supported by the Pulmonology task force (assessed as Mid-importance). Viruses Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Viruses, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of viruses on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.VirusesWikipedia:WikiProject VirusesTemplate:WikiProject Virusesvirus articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. China: History High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject China, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of China related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ChinaWikipedia:WikiProject ChinaTemplate:WikiProject ChinaChina-related articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. This article is supported by WikiProject Chinese history (assessed as High-importance). Science Policy High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Science Policy, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Science policy on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Science PolicyWikipedia:WikiProject Science PolicyTemplate:WikiProject Science PolicyScience Policy articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Skepticism High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Skepticism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of science, pseudoscience, pseudohistory and skepticism related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SkepticismWikipedia:WikiProject SkepticismTemplate:WikiProject SkepticismSkepticism articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Espionage Low‑importance COVID-19 misinformation is within the scope of WikiProject Espionage, which aims to improve Wikipedia's coverage of espionage, intelligence, and related topics. If you would like to participate, visit the project page, or contribute to the discussion.EspionageWikipedia:WikiProject EspionageTemplate:WikiProject EspionageEspionage articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. International relations High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject International relations, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of International relations on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.International relationsWikipedia:WikiProject International relationsTemplate:WikiProject International relationsInternational relations articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Journalism High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Journalism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of journalism on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.JournalismWikipedia:WikiProject JournalismTemplate:WikiProject JournalismJournalism articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Politics High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Politics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of politics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PoliticsWikipedia:WikiProject PoliticsTemplate:WikiProject Politicspolitics articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Psychology Low‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Psychology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Psychology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PsychologyWikipedia:WikiProject PsychologyTemplate:WikiProject Psychologypsychology articles Low This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale. Media High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Media, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Media on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.MediaWikipedia:WikiProject MediaTemplate:WikiProject MediaMedia articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. WikiProject Media To-do List: Here are some tasks awaiting attention: Article requests : Mackay Radio Cleanup : Media influence, Video game culture, Sound bite NPOV : Content (media and publishing) Verify : Multimedia, Alternative media, Alternative newspaper Other : Answer requests for comments Internet High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Internet, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the Internet on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.InternetWikipedia:WikiProject InternetTemplate:WikiProject InternetInternet articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Internet culture High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Internet culture, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of internet culture on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Internet cultureWikipedia:WikiProject Internet cultureTemplate:WikiProject Internet cultureInternet culture articles High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. WikiProject Internet culture To-do: edit history watch purge Here are some tasks awaiting attention: Article requests : View all requested internet culture articles Expand : Pick an article from hereorhere Photo : Category:Internet culture articles needing images Stubs : All stubs are located here Other : Category:Internet self-classification codes (!?); Try to get YouTube to FA; Tag all articles you find with {{WikiProject Internet culture}} See also Category:Internet culture articles needing attention This article has been mentioned by multiple media organizations: Omer Benjakob (9 February 2020). "On Wikipedia, a fight is raging over coronavirus disinformation". Wired. Retrieved 15 February 2020. Noam Cohen (15 February 2020). "How Wikipedia Prevents the Spread of Coronavirus Misinformation". Wired. Retrieved 15 February 2020. Renée DiResta (21 July 2021). "The CDC Should Be More Like Wikipedia". The Atlantic. Retrieved 21 July 2021. Text and/or other creative content from this versionofMisinformation related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic was copied or moved into 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic with this edit on 12 April 2020. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists. Text has been copied to or from this article; see the list below. The source pages now serve to provide attribution for the content in the destination pages and must not be deleted as long as the copies exist. For attribution and to access older versions of the copied text, please see the history links below. Copied Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic (oldid, history) → Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic by the United States (diff) Copied Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic (oldid, history) → Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic by governments (diff) The contents of the COVID-19 denialism page were merged into COVID-19 misinformation on 24 February 2023. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected page, please see its history; for the discussion at that location, see its talk page. This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 10 January 2022 and 27 April 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Phrenic490 (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Lucyc2.

Daily pageviews of this article A graph should have been displayed here but graphs are temporarily disabled. Until they are enabled again, visit the interactive graph at pageviews.wmcloud.org

Section sizes Section size for COVID-19 misinformation (97 sections) Section name Byte count Section total (Top) 6,120 6,120 Overview 17,875 17,875 Virus origin 18,366 138,902 Wuhan lab origin 390 27,695 Bio-weapon 10,033 10,033 Gain-of-function research 5,224 5,224 Accidental release of collected sample 12,048 12,048 Stolen from Canadian lab 5,350 5,350 Accusations by China 17,375 17,375 Accusations by Russia 8,468 8,468 Accusations by other countries 16,833 16,833 Jewish origin 53 9,226 In the Muslim world 5,758 5,758 In the United States 872 872 In Germany 1,249 1,249 In Britain 1,294 1,294 Muslims spreading virus 3,604 3,604 Population-control scheme 2,313 2,313 5G mobile networks 24,868 24,868 American scientist selling virus to China 1,803 1,803 Meteor origin 1,218 1,218 NCMI intelligence report 1,783 1,783 PCR testing 5,245 5,245 Symptoms and severity 2,996 2,996 Incidence and mortality 825 32,657 In China 15 9,819 Chinese under-reporting during early 2020 1,866 1,866 Nurse whistleblower 2,753 2,753 Alleged leak of death toll by Tencent 1,810 1,810 Mass cremation in Wuhan 2,480 2,480 Decline in cellphone subscriptions 895 895 In the US 2,393 10,857 Allegations of inflated death counts 3,660 3,660 Misleading Johns Hopkins News-Letter article 4,804 4,804 Misinformation targeting Taiwan 6,772 6,772 Misrepresented World Population Project map 1,061 1,061 "Casedemic" 3,323 3,323 Disease spread 1,315 43,835 California herd immunity in 2019 3,752 3,752 Patient Zero 1,700 1,700 Airborne 4,439 4,439 Surfaces 1,703 1,703 Susceptibility based on ethnicity 6,501 12,844 Xenophobic blaming by ethnicity and religion 6,343 6,343 Bat soup 5,461 5,461 Large gatherings 799 799 Lifetime of the virus 713 713 Mosquitoes 139 139 Contaminated objects 2,489 2,489 Cruise ships as safe havens 6,204 6,204 Breastfeeding 699 699 Sexual transmission and infertility 1,578 1,578 Prevention 1,149 42,084 Hand sanitizer, antibacterial soaps 3,471 3,471 Public use of face masks 12,538 12,538 Alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs 6,809 6,809 Warm or hot drinks 986 986 Religious protection 9,574 9,574 Helicopter spraying 1,449 1,449 Food 2,391 2,391 Vitamin D 3,717 3,717 Vaccines 272 272 Hospital conditions 1,562 1,562 Treatment 553 30,936 Herbal treatments 2,984 2,984 Vitamin C 1,843 1,843 Common cold and flu treatments 2,430 2,430 Cow dung and urine 3,714 3,714 2-Deoxy-D-glucose 2,333 2,333 Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) prescriptions 2,917 2,917 Chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine 1,625 1,625 Ivermectin 86 86 Dangerous treatments 2,642 2,642 Silver 4,105 4,105 Mustard oil 832 832 Untested treatments 2,817 2,817 Spiritual healing 1,469 1,469 Organ trafficking 586 586 Other 10 15,186 Name of the disease 1,560 1,560 Simpsons prediction 1,043 1,043 Return of wildlife 4,374 4,374 Virus remains in body permanently 305 305 COVID-19 denialism 2,750 2,750 Antisemitism 2,272 2,272 US anti-vax anti-China covert operation 2,872 2,872 Efforts to combat misinformation 2,821 29,169 Social media 7,476 7,476 Wikipedia 2,541 2,541 Newspapers and scholarly journals 2,183 2,183 Podcasts 1,320 1,320 Government censorship 12,828 12,828 Scams 5,908 5,908 See also 266 266 Notes 24 24 References 28 28 External links 2,817 2,817 Total 375,882 375,882

• 1 Origins of COVID-19: Current consensus
• 2 Lab leak theory sources
• 3 PCR testing
• 4 Misinformation on school safety
• 5 Link to Wikipedia article "Infodemic"
• 6 " to stoke anti-China sentiments, and has led to increased anti-Asian activity on social media and in the real world.

1. There is no consensus on whether the lab leak theory is a "conspiracy theory" or a "minority scientific viewpoint". (RfC, February 2021)
2. There is consensus against defining "disease and pandemic origins" (broadly speaking) as a form of biomedical information for the purpose of WP:MEDRS. However, information that already fits into biomedical information remains classified as such, even if it relates to disease and pandemic origins (e.g. genome sequences, symptom descriptions, phylogenetic trees). (RfC, May 2021)
3. In multiple prior non-RFC discussions about manuscripts authored by Rossana Segreto and/or Yuri Deigin, editors have found the sources to be unreliable. Specifically, editors were not convinced by the credentials of the authors, and concerns were raised with the editorial oversight of the BioEssays "Problems & Paradigms" series. (Jan 2021, Jan 2021, Jan 2021, Feb 2021, June 2021, ...)
4. The consensus of scientists is that SARS-CoV-2 is likely of zoonotic origin. (January 2021, May 2021, May 2021, May 2021, June 2021, June 2021, WP:NOLABLEAK (frequently cited in discussions))
5. The March 2021 WHO report on the origins of SARS-CoV-2 should be referred to as the "WHO-convened report" or "WHO-convened study" on first usage in article prose, and may be abbreviated as "WHO report" or "WHO study" thereafter. (RfC, June 2021)
6. The "manufactured bioweapon" idea should be described as a "conspiracy theory" in wiki-voice. (January 2021, February 2021, May 2021, May 2021, June 2021, June 2021, June 2021, June 2021, July 2021, July 2021, July 2021, August 2021)
7. The scientific consensus (and the Frutos et al. sources ([1][2]) which support it), which dismisses the lab leak, should not be described as "based in part on Shi [Zhengli]'s emailed answers." (RfC, December 2021)
8. The American FBI and Department of Energy finding that a lab leak was likely should not be mentioned in the lead of COVID-19 lab leak theory, because it is WP:UNDUE. (RFC, October 2023)
9. The article COVID-19 lab leak theory may not go through the requested moves process between 4 March 2024 and 3 March 2025. (RM, March 2024)

Which pages use this template?

Last updated (diff) on 15 March 2024 by Novem Linguae (t · c)

List of good sources with good coverage to help expand. Not necessarily for inclusion but just for consideration. Preferably not articles that just discuss a single quote/press conference. The long-style reporting would be even better. Feel free to edit directly to add to the list. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 17:39, 18 July 2021 (UTC)Reply

Last updated by Julian Brown (talk) 23:43, 12 November 2023 (UTC)Reply

Languages