With billions of monthly active users, Facebook has an unprecedented ability for the dissemination of information. In healthcare, attempts have been made to utilize this tool for goals such as predicting disease onset; however, shared articles that omit information or propagate incorrect statements may have a negative effect. The goal of this study was to assess the accuracy of information in the nascent months of the 2019-2020 Covid-19 outbreak.
The fifty most popular articles on Facebook for the period between November 2019 and March 25, 2020 (as collated by Buzzsumo- a social media analyzing tool) were analyzed by independent researchers and sorted into classifications for accurate, inaccurate and misleading. Following evaluation, 32% of articles were deemed to be accurate, 18% inaccurate, and 50% misleading (as defined by containing both accurate and inaccurate information). To restate, 68% of the 50 most popular articles on Facebook were not accurate during the study period. Impressions, shares and comments on Facebook in a summation of inaccurate and misleading articles were also analyzed in separate fashion and found to be 71.44%, 74.97%, and 80.22% respectively. These numbers outpace the 68% of total articles for which these types of stories account.
In addition, shares were individually assessed as they indicate a desire to propagate the information forward on the part of the user, and were found to have occurred 6.61 million times in the inaccurate and misleading group compared to 2.2 million for accurate articles, for a cumulative rate of 74.9% of shares, again outpacing the 68% expected.
There is a high rate of both inaccurate and misleading information related to the Covid-19 outbreak on Facebook, as assessed by physician reviewers. This information is not only more prevalent than the accurate information, but also received more engagement via overall impressions, as well as shares and comments. Although there is no clear remedy for this phenomenon, its implications range from general distrust to non-adherence to precaution guidelines or required actions. There is also a question regarding Facebook’s policing of itself and the content on its site, as well as that content published to it from other websites.