COVID-19 misinformation by the United States

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A Cornell University study found that former U.S. President Donald Trump was "likely the largest driver" of the COVID-19 misinformation infodemic in English-language media,[3] downplaying the virus and promoting unapproved drugs.

[6] Former United States President Donald Trump and his top economic adviser Larry Kudlow have been accused of spreading misinformation about the coronavirus.

"[10][11][12][13] At the time, SARS-CoV-2 had been spreading in the United States undetected for weeks,[14] and new vaccine development may require a minimum of a year to prove safety and efficacy to gain regulatory approval.

Their statements range from false to unproven, and in some cases, underestimate the challenges that public health officials must contend with in responding to the virus.

[24][25][26] Trump repeatedly compared COVID-19 to influenza, despite the fact that COVID-19's mortality rate is estimated to be approximately ten times higher.

This led the FDA to say it had not approved any drugs or therapies for COVID-19, and strongly advised people against taking it outside of a hospital or clinical trial, due to possibly fatal side effects.

Potentially serious side effects from chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine include irregular heartbeats, tinnitus, blurred vision, muscle weakness or "mental changes".

[42] An Arizona engineer in his 60s died after ingesting a fish tank cleaner containing chloroquine phosphate in a vitamin cocktail prepared by his wife.

The wife stated she intended to medicate her husband against the coronavirus after hearing Trump tout the potential benefits of chloroquine during a public briefing.

[47] From April 2 to 9, the White House was in a standoff with CNN, which frequently declined to air the daily coronavirus Task Force briefings, and which fact-checked Trump's remarks.

[50][51] During an April 15 White House news conference, Trump said the US government is trying to determine if the COVID-19 virus emanated from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

[57] In 2024, a New York Times fact-check determined Trump «did not instruct people to inject bleach, but suggested that doing so with a disinfectant was an “interesting” concept to test out».

[59] After the president's remarks, the United States Environmental Protection Agency, the makers of Lysol, the World Health Organization, and other government officials issued various advisories pointing out that it is already known to be harmful to use disinfectants or ultraviolet radiation on human bodies instead of inanimate surfaces, and Birx explained that these were not under investigation as possible treatments.

He called for the White House to communicate "very clearly on the facts", because people "certainly pay attention when the president of the United States is standing there giving a press conference".

In May 2020, The Guardian published an article revealing that the United States government was funding a website in Armenia called Medmedia.am that was spreading COVID-19 disinformation, including discouraging Armenians from participating in future vaccination programs.

[67][72] In the same speech, Trump contradicted several public health experts by saying that the U.S. will "likely have a therapeutic and/or vaccine solution long before the end of the year".

[73] In a recorded interview with Bob Woodward on February 7, 2020, Trump underscored the deadliness of the coronavirus in his recount of a conversation with Chinese Communist Party general secretary Xi Jinping, but, in another recorded interview with Woodward on March 19, Trump revealed that he wanted to downplay the viral outbreak in order to not create a panic.

[75] As reported cases reached new record highs in October 2020, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy named "ending the Covid-19 pandemic" as a top accomplishment of the Trump administration.

[79][80] Several members of the U.S. Senate—particularly Richard Burr (R-NC) and Kelly Loeffler (R-GA)—have come under scrutiny for sales of large amounts of stocks before the financial markets crashed due to the outbreak, sparking accusations that they had insider knowledge from closed-door briefings, while many of them publicly downplayed the risks posed by the health crisis to the US public.

This disinformation campaign involved using fake social media accounts posing as native speakers to promote content emphasizing the Chinese origins of COVID-19 and alleging that the Sinovac vaccine was unsafe and contained pork-derived ingredients, making it haram under Islamic law.

[88] In response, Department of Defense spokeswoman Lisa Lawrence acknowledged that the Pentagon conducted a wide range of operations in the "information environment" to counter "adversary malign influence" on various platforms including social media.

[92] In February 2020, New York City Health Commissioner Oxiris Barbot announced "We're telling New Yorkers, go about your lives, take the subway, go out, enjoy life.

"[93] Barbot also tweeted, "As we gear up to celebrate the #LunarNewYear in NYC, I want to assure New Yorkers that there is no reason for anyone to change their holiday plans, avoid the subway, or certain parts of the city because of #coronavirus.

"[94] According to The Washington Post in March 2020, Republican government members were largely influenced by series of articles by Richard A. Epstein of the Hoover Institution, who consistently played down the scale of the epidemics, ridiculed the "panic" being spread by "progressives", made a number of incorrect statements about the SARS-CoV-2 virus, misapplied and misconstrued Darwinian evolutionary theory in regards to the pandemics, and predicted "about 500 deaths at the end" of the epidemics.

[95] U.S. Representative Louie Gohmert from Texas hinted in July that he caught coronavirus because he wore a mask more often in the days leading up to his infection.

[96] In spring 2020, Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York City, was widely criticized for providing poor and misleading information to the public.

[100] In summer 2020, then-U.S. Presidential nominee Joe Biden argued that Trump's response to the pandemic was to offer "denials, delays, and distractions, many of which were xenophobic".

[101] In July 2020, Biden also made various claims against the Trump administration's pandemic response that were rated misleading and inaccurate in a fact check by The New York Times.

[104] In a February 2021 opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claimed that "most signs point to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, or WIV, as the source of Covid-19",[105] a theory that has been described as 'extremely unlikely' by World Health Organization scientists in a preliminary investigation into the origins of the virus.