Concerns that COVID-19 misinformation gets promoted on Facebook have made major health organizations hesitant to promote vaccine content on the site, Politico reported Oct. 27.
Five things to know:
- Authoritative health actors, such as the World Health Organization and UNICEF, expressed concern about advertising on Facebook because they don't want to encourage anti-vaccine users to comment warnings on their pages, a Facebook memo stated. While UNICEF continued to share pro-vaccine content, it is unclear how much advertising the institutions have used.
- About 40 percent of all comments on Facebook are related to vaccine hesitancy, and anti-vaccine activists have been able to fuel COVID-19 misinformation, according to disclosures made to the Securities and Exchange Commission that were obtained by Politico.
- Facebook's newsfeed algorithm has been criticized for pushing content based on if it's popular rather than if it's appropriate for the user.
- Rampant misinformation has drowned out pro-vaccine initiatives, like providing free advertising on Facebook to promote getting vaccinated.
- Andy Stone, a spokesperson for Facebook, told Politico that the social media platform has used its resources to cut vaccine hesitancy by half and remove COVID-19 misinformation.