Fake news about the coronavirus is hazardous to your health. Don't fall for it: Doctor

My dad recently forwarded me a message that said if you could hold your breath for 10 seconds, you were proven not to be infected by the novel coronavirus. This is false information. As a hospital-based internal medicine physician, I have had patients sick with COVID-19 who had enough lung reserve to pass the 10-second test. The information is not just wrong; it is also potentially dangerous. Healthy people can be asymptomatic yet still be carriers of the virus and spread it.

When I asked my 70-year-old father where he got this information, he told me he saw it on Facebook. Thinking only older adults might be susceptible to this kind of sham reporting, I was surprised to receive the same message from a friend my age. This 32-year-old, college-educated professional had fallen for the same trick.

I was soon inundated with questions and advice about different herbs, vitamins, essential oils and even alcohol as treatments or preventatives for COVID-19 infections. These queries came from all age groups, from teenagers to retirees, each sincerely believing what they had read on Facebook, WeChat and other social networking sites. Older relatives insisted I drink malodorous herbal soups after reading on these sites that they had healing properties.

A wellspring of hoaxes and 'fake news'

The internet is an almost infinite source of knowledge on any subject, but it can also be a wellspring of hoaxes, half-truths and what our president aptly calls “fake news.” In this extraordinary time, it is more important than ever to sift for the truth, especially as it relates to the COVID-19 pandemic.

But how do we know what is true and what is deception, when even the young and tech savvy among us are duped into falsehoods, such as being able to flush the coronavirus away with a glass of warm water? Or when someone with thousands of Instagram followers promotes silver as a COVID-19 cure? Or when even our president spreads false information during official coronavirus briefings? How can we know the truth in this overwhelming landscape of information?

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Unfortunately, the answer is not simple. Step one is to use a reputable, often cited or primary news outlet, which should always provide specific sources for the information they report. Step two is to double-check against other trusted news outlets and always look for the source of information. Trying to distill truth from opinion can be more difficult than it sounds in some major news outlet sources, but they can also be a good resource when checked and confirmed against what other outlets are saying.

No one is immune to misinformation 

Unfortunately, stories from vague, unreliable sources that are often seen on social media — or worse, forwarded from distant relatives or friends on these platforms — definitely need to be taken with skepticism. According to Bot Sentinel, a site that uses machine learning to identify potential social media bots, on March 26 alone there were 828 incidents of trending tweets using the hashtag #coronavirus from potential bot accounts (and nearly twice that many if you count #COVID19 and #Coronavirus as well).

Many messages passed along to me claimed to have cures heard from a friend of a friend, or a friend of a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official, or a health practitioner. I urge you to put more stock into medical professionals such as doctors and nurses with accredited degrees. If you have further questions or concerns, seek answers from your primary care physician.

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Currently, there is no home remedy for COVID-19. The best prevention is physical distancing and protection against droplet transmission via frequent hand washing and physical barriers. The only way to definitively confirm you have the virus is by medical testing through your doctor. Be wary of any other information you get. Whether you are old or young, you may not be immune to the misinformation out there.

Dr. Thomas Ken Lew is an assistant clinical professor of medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine and an attending physician of hospital medicine at Stanford Health Care–ValleyCare. Follow him on Twitter: @ThomasLewMD