Below are the citation and extracts from a new paper in BMJ Global Health. A key finding is that 'videos containing non-factual information averaged 14 times more likes than dislikes'.
CITATION: BMJ Global Health: YouTube as a source of misinformation on COVID-19 vaccination: a systematic analysis
Heidi Oi-Yee Li et al
Correspondence to Dr Mark G Kirchhof; mkirchho@uottawa.ca
https://gh.bmj.com/content/7/3/e008334?utm_source=adestra&utm_medium=ema...
ABSTRACT
Introduction: Vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 have been accessible to the public since December 2020. However, only 58.3% of Americans are fully vaccinated as of 5 November 2021. Numerous studies have supported YouTube as a source of both reliable and misleading information during the COVID-19 pandemic...
Methods: A search on YouTube was performed on 21 July 2021, using keywords ‘COVID-19 vaccine’ on a cleared-cache web browser. Search results were sorted by ‘views’, and the top 150 most-viewed videos were collected and analysed...
Results: Approximately 11% of YouTube’s most viewed videos on COVID-19 vaccines, accounting for 18 million views, contradicted information from the WHO or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention... videos containing non-factual information averaged 14 times more likes than dislikes...
What do the new findings imply? Despite efforts by YouTube in combatting health misinformation, a substantial portion of highly viewed content contains misinformation regarding COVID-19 vaccines continues to be hosted by the second-largest social media platform. Public health officials and clinicians should recognise the impact of YouTube and other social media platforms as sources of health information and misinformation for patients and leverage these platforms to disseminate high-quality content to combat misinformation given poor vaccination uptake.
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Neil Pakenham-Walsh, Global Coordinator HIFA, www.hifa.org neil@hifa.org
