Social Media Contagion: The Case Of Coronavirus
Written by Gylf Forsberg, Culture Staff Writer, and illustrated by Katie Herrick, Culture Editor
The advent of social media has increased the brevity and quantity of information that we read and absorb each day. We are constantly connected to news outlets, and at times it may seem hard to shut it off. Celebrity drama, political shuffling and updates on current events are constantly streaming into our lives through our many devices.
However, something that hasn’t been documented by social media is the outbreak of a new disease. While many are able to recall the confusion and concern surrounding H1N1—swine flu—when it erupted in the spring of 2009, this disease was detected at a time when social media, while present, was not as rampant as today (Mayo Clinic, 2019).
The expanse and grip that social media has on our lives has greatly affected the perception of the current disease in question, the 2019 Novel Coronavirus. While the virus in question is of importance, it should not be the main priority of the American populace.
The virus, which was first detected Jan. 9, 2020, is part of a family of viruses that include SARS and MERS as well as other common human viral infections (Centers for Disease Control, 2020). This disease has been found to be centralized around the Chinese city of Wuhan, with a maximum of eight cases in any country outside of China (New York Times, 2020).
In short, someone living in the United States has no immediate worry about this virus, unless one has recently traveled to the Chinese city of Wuhan. Additionally, the U.S. has set strict screening guidelines in several airports and land crossings to monitor the disease (New York Times, 2020).
The contagion of social media has caused an uproar—some may say hysteria—in the U.S. about this virus. While I am not saying this virus is not a serious global health, I am saying that I believe there are currently more pressing health concerns at the time…say, the flu?
The common flu is a consistent health issue in the U.S., yet it seems that several do not hold any amount of fear or concern with this viral infection. From Oct. 2019 to the end of Jan. 2020, the CDC estimates that there have been 10,000-25,000 deaths attributed to the common flu (Centers for Disease Control, 2020).
The 2019-2020 common flu is incredibly prevalent in the U.S. and much more deadly than the new coronavirus, but no one seems to be talking about it. This infection is much closer to home and the chances of you contracting it in the U.S. are much higher than that of coronavirus. Furthermore, this viral contagion is highly preventable with flu shots being increasingly available for many throughout the U.S.
Is it simply the newness of the coronavirus that is scaring the U.S. public? Or is it also because it is a strange virus coming from a foreign country?
Similar to the recent Ebola outbreak in 2014, the hysteria surrounding the disease may be partly attributed to racist tendencies of the U.S. Arielle Duhaime-Ross writes of the racism surrounding the Ebola panic in 2014; “immigrants…were facing immense discrimination. Some have been turned away from their jobs, while others have been refused service in restaurants,” (Duhaime-Ross, 2014).
These individuals were targets because of their skin color and accents, even though they had never come into contact with the Ebola virus, the area afflicted or anyone infected. This racism and xenophobia, already rampant in this country, is intensified and paralleled in the recent coronavirus episode, this time targeting anyone who appears Asian or of Asian descent.
The racism and xenophobia are only conflated with the rampant spread across the various social media outlets we interact with every day. False statements from agencies and fabricated images and video footage have prompted Twitter to issue statements urging users who search ‘coronavirus’ to instead visit the CDC’s website for accurate information (Somvichian-Clausen, 2020).
This novel coronavirus is no doubt causing an outbreak in the United States, but not an outbreak of disease, rather an outbreak of misinformation, hysteria and racist xenophobia.
Sources
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2019-2020 U.S. Flu Season: Preliminary Burden Estimates. (2020, January 31). U.S. Department of Health & Human Services
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Coronavirus. (2020, January 10). U.S. Department of Health & Human Services
Duhaime-Ross, A. (2014, October 8). Ebola panic is getting pretty racist. The Verge
Somvichian-Clausen, A. (2020, January 31). The coronavirus is causing an outbreak in America-of anti-Asian racism. Changing America: The Hill.
Mayo Clinic. Swine flu (H1N1 flu). (2019, January 10). Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research
The New York Times. (2020, January 28). Coronavirus: Death Toll Climbs, and So Does the Number of Infections. The New York Times Company.