Pandemic may not yet have infected our health, but it has certainly affected a good part of our lives and our world. It closed companies, condemning many to unemployment, it clogged health services, with consequences for all the patients who have and those who do not have Covid, it removed us from our “elders” and everything they mean to us and us to they.
Pandemic may not yet have infected our health, but it has certainly affected a good part of our lives and our world. It closed companies, condemning many to unemployment, it clogged health services, with consequences for all the patients who have and those who do not have Covid, it removed us from our “elders” and everything they mean to us and us to they.In the world of information, changes have also been felt. And health misinformation usually has serious effects because it leads to dangerous behavior.
Covid-19 was once a cold, in the words of the Brazilian President, Jair Bolsonaro. However, its dimension proved that we cannot ignore it and led governments to dictate total and partial confinements and long daily curfews. The virus still prevents social gatherings and seriously restricts the ceremonies that mark the stages of our life: baptisms, weddings and even funerals.
In the information world, viral news attested – in journalistic jargon – the importance and / or receptivity to what had been written. A news that went viral was one that reached, usually through social networks, a huge amount of people. It was confused with the power of a virus like Covid-19, but it guaranteed an audience and that was important.
Today, information and disinformation coexist, particularly in the area of health, as I have already mentioned. I almost dare say that, worse than denialists, they are those who repeat that the disease is not that serious. Relativists, if you want to give it a name.
Hence the importance of fighting this viral world in which we live. The virus does not only threaten our health, but – in the end – our entire way of life. Information consumption and politics (to give two examples) after being contaminated are also contagious.
Viral information – which may be correct – requires more scrutiny and politicians to better diagnose, so that they do not go viral.
