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Church in Lomé, Togo: Religious leaders play an important role in fighting fake news
Photo: Philippe Lissac / Godong / robertharding / imago images
Nighat Arif recently celebrated her corona vaccination on TikTok: She holds her Covid-19 vaccination card in the camera, the video is underlaid with a hip-hop song to which she makes lip movements: “Now stop and let your homeboy hit it «, now stop and let your homeboy take over.
The young doctor from Buckinghamshire near London explains about Corona protective measures on the video platform, but also on Instagram and Twitter; almost 74,000 users follow her on TikTok alone.
She is Muslim and wears a headscarf, speaks Urdu and Punjabi in addition to English.
With her videos, she wants to reach immigrant communities from South Asian countries such as India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, who are skeptical of the British government's vaccination campaign.
"I wanted to let my community know that the vaccination was safe," says Arif, explaining her mission.
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The doctor Nighat Arif advertises the corona vaccination on TikTok
Photo: drnighatarif / TikTok
While governments in countries like Great Britain have already started their vaccination campaigns and other countries are still waiting for vaccines, new waves of misinformation about corona vaccination are spreading worldwide - and are fueling fears.
Postings in social networks and messengers such as WhatsApp and Telegram warn that vaccination against corona makes you impotent, can change DNA, lead to homosexuality or be fatal.
Muslims, but also Hindus, Sikhs and Orthodox Jews around the world are skeptical because the vaccines allegedly contain pigs, cows or alcohol.
Researchers at Cambridge University consider fake news to be a “major threat to public health” - in an international study from October 2020 they showed a “clear connection” between believing in fake news and the willingness to be vaccinated against Covid-19.
The greater the trust in health professionals, the greater the likelihood that someone will get vaccinated.
And the more susceptible people are to rumors about the pandemic and classify them as facts, the less willing they are to get vaccinated, adhere to corona rules or recommend protective measures to friends and family members.
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With a mask, please: Men in front of a wall painting in Mumbai, India
Photo: Himanshu Bhatt / NurPhoto / Getty Images
The feeling of being part of a minority, social inequality, distrust of politics, science and the media, but also a lack of education and a lack of analytical and critical thinking skills are factors that, according to studies, make people more susceptible to false news.
According to a survey by the Royal Society for Public Health, people with lower incomes, but also social minorities, are particularly skeptical of corona vaccinations in Great Britain - although they are affected by higher numbers of infections and corona death rates because they are usually less able to protect themselves .
Social minorities have also often experienced racism and discrimination - their trust in the government and the health system has been shattered.
Language barriers also make it difficult for the state to convey the importance of Corona measures to people with a migration background.
Imams as influencers
The UK Department of Health is now working with religious leaders to reach out to these communities and get false news
to expose.
Imams declare during Friday prayers that the vaccines are "halal" and appeal to Muslims to get vaccinated to protect their community.
The Muslim umbrella organization also shares educational videos on its Facebook page in which clergy and health experts refute conspiracy theories.
Sometimes it is religious leaders and influencers themselves who spread such fake news - on the other hand, they can play a key role in combating rumors, because in many places they have more influence on their followers than the state
or medical professionals.
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Social distance and corona vaccination reminder: Mosques are an important element in the UK vaccination campaign
Photo: Kirsty Wigglesworth / AP
The social networks are now also taking stronger action against fake news, they delete content and provide misleading posts with warnings.
Moderators and algorithms try to track down rumors, disinformation campaigns and suspicious bot accounts that automatically distribute content.
WhatsApp as a super spreader
However, many corona rumors spread via encrypted messengers, mostly in private groups that are a black box for moderators, fact checkers, but also researchers.
Around two billion people around the world currently use WhatsApp - a super spreader for disinformation.
"Messenger apps could be the main source of spreading misinformation," said a study by the Harvard Kennedy School, which last year examined the role of WhatsApp in India, Nigeria and Pakistan.
The fake news consists "mostly of anonymous rumors that do not refer to external sources."
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Many Indians get information on WhatsApp - rumors circulate particularly quickly there
Photo: Himanshu Bhatt / NurPhoto / Getty Images
With more than 400 million users, India is the world's largest market for WhatsApp.
In recent years, millions of people have been able to afford a smartphone and Internet access for the first time thanks to low tariffs, and according to a study by the Reuters Institute, 68 percent of Indians use the smartphone as a source of news, 52 percent only get information via WhatsApp or Facebook.
However, many users lack media skills, especially in rural areas: "Many Indians do not know how to deal with the mass of information, what information they can trust - they are the easiest victims for conspiracy theories," says journalist Pratik Sinha, founder of Fact-checking website AltNews.in.
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In Latin America, but also in Africa, evangelists advertise dubious remedies - as an alternative to vaccination
Photo: CARLOS JASSO / REUTERS
In Brazil, the second largest WhatsApp market, initiatives such as Aos Fatos or the Projeto Comprova alliance are trying to get WhatsApp users to submit suspicious information from their chats for review (debunking) - and later to share the corrected reports.
According to the Harvard study, people are more likely to trust fact checks and disseminate them further if they come from sources that they believe to be credible - especially friends, family members or people with similar ideological or political views.
Religiously based rumors are often more difficult to debunk - since users see criticism as an attack on their beliefs.
And pastors like Oscar Gutierrez from Mexico reach an audience of millions online and incite their followers against the state's corona policy.
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Faith instead of science: Many evangelical churches are spreading false news in the pandemic
Photo: UIG / imago images
In African countries, too, many of the evangelical free churches that believe in the healing power of God rather than medicine organize their followers in WhatsApp groups: "Why do we need a vaccination when the blood of Jesus protects us?"
The pharmaceutical companies would make the African population sterile, destroy sperm and thus stop population growth: Rumors of this kind from social networks intensify vaccination reservations across the continent.
Tanzania's President John Magafuli, for example, has personally warned against vaccinations from the west and called them "dangerous".
He asked the population to pray away from Corona instead.
"Many rumors start from religious groups," confirms Ayoade Alakija.
The Nigerian is a consultant for the "Convince" campaign, which aims to educate people about corona vaccines and combat fake news.
“The biggest problem is inequality,” she says.
"Because almost no vaccinations arrive here, they are considered a product of the West."
South Africa has only just started vaccinating medical staff, and the first doses arrived in Ghana on Wednesday.
But most countries are still waiting for the vaccines.
"When the state health system doesn't work, people turn to God and hope for miracles," says Alakij.
She too now wants to turn the tables and work with religious leaders.
"Only with their help can we stop the fake news."
In the Philippines, the Catholic Church is already offering itself as a sparring partner for the state.
Archbishop Romulo Valles, President of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has announced that churches will be transformed into vaccination stations - he and other clergy also want to be publicly vaccinated.
Around 90 percent of Filipinos are Christians, according to the 2019 Philippine Trust Index (PTI), citizens believe more in the church than the state.
Alongside Afghanistan, Indonesia, Pakistan and South Korea, the Philippines are among the countries in which, according to a study, trust in vaccinations fell particularly sharply between 2015 and 2019.
After the country had a bad experience with a dengue vaccination campaign, many parents stopped vaccinating their children at all.
And Filipinos often trust social media more than traditional media, which makes them more susceptible to fake news - which is mainly spread via Facebook and Facebook Messenger.
"Many experience Facebook as the Internet and do not recognize the difference between the pages of established news organizations and social media groups that spread fake news," says Gemma Mendoza.
The Duterte government's smear campaigns against the media have also destroyed trust in journalism.
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Gemma Mendoza researches disinformation on the news platform »Rappler«
Photo: private
The 47-year-old from Manila heads the research team on misinformation at the »Rappler« platform, one of Facebook's partner organizations.
»Rappler« does fact-checking and is currently building a volunteer network with MovePH made up of students, local journalists and civil society organizations.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, the trainers have taught fact-checking techniques to around 3,000 participants in webinars.
Mendoza believes that the church could make a difference with its commitment: »The church is very active on social media.
Although it has lost some of its influence in recent years, it is still a significant force, ”she says.
Whether the clergy can defeat the vaccination panic remains to be seen - it is still unclear when the first citizens will be able to receive a vaccination.
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