Department of Health Science, University of Florence, 50134 Florence, Italy.
Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2020 Aug 12;17(16):5850. doi: 10.3390/ijerph17165850.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, risk communication has often been ineffective, and from this perspective "fake news" has found fertile ground, both as a cause and a consequence of it. The aim of this study is to measure how much "fake news" and corresponding verified news have circulated in Italy in the period between 31 December 2019 and 30 April 2020, and to estimate the quality of informal and formal communication. We used the BuzzSumo application to gather the most shared links on the Internet related to the pandemic in Italy, using keywords chosen according to the most frequent "fake news" during that period. For each research we noted the numbers of "fake news" articles and science-based news articles, as well as the number of engagements. We reviewed 2102 articles. Links that contained fake news were shared 2,352,585 times, accounting for 23.1% of the total shares of all the articles reviewed. Our study throws light on the "fake news" phenomenon in the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. A quantitative assessment is fundamental in order to understand the impact of false information and to define political and technical interventions in health communication. Starting from this evaluation, health literacy should be improved by means of specific interventions in order to improve informal and formal communication.
在新冠疫情期间，风险沟通往往效果不佳，从这个角度来看，“假新闻”找到了肥沃的土壤，既是其原因也是其结果。本研究旨在衡量在 2019 年 12 月 31 日至 2020 年 4 月 30 日期间，意大利有多少“假新闻”和相应的核实新闻传播，并评估非正式和正式沟通的质量。我们使用 BuzzSumo 应用程序收集了与意大利大流行相关的互联网上最常分享的链接，使用的关键词是根据那段时间最常见的“假新闻”选择的。对于每一项研究，我们记录了“假新闻”文章和基于科学的新闻文章的数量，以及参与度。我们共审查了 2102 篇文章。含有假新闻的链接被分享了 2352585 次，占所有被审查文章总分享量的 23.1%。我们的研究揭示了 SARS-CoV-2 大流行中的“假新闻”现象。为了了解虚假信息的影响并确定卫生沟通方面的政治和技术干预措施，进行定量评估至关重要。在此评估的基础上，应通过特定干预措施提高健康素养，以改善非正式和正式沟通。
