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CoronaCheck #98
This week, we investigate a tweet shared by Senator Matt Canavan which implies that a renowned medical journal has argued for a rethink on vaccine mandates.
We also bring you a slew of fact checks in relation to the Canadian truck convoy protesting mandates, and share the latest on the ongoing Spotify controversy.
Tweet shared by Matt Canavan skews the truth about The Lancet's view of vaccine mandates
A Tweet incorrectly implying that a prestigious medical journal was advocating for "mandatory vaccination policies" to be "reconsidered" has been shared by federal Nationals senator Matt Canavan.
The post, which was retweeted by former Australian basketballer and anti-vaccine mandate advocate Andrew Bogut before being shared by Senator Canavan, features a screenshot of text published on The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal website, alongside a link.
According to the displayed text, recent evidence suggests that the viral load present in those diagnosed with COVID-19 is similar in both vaccinated and unvaccinated people.
"The current evidence suggests that current mandatory vaccination policies might need to be reconsidered," reads a highlighted section of the text.
But while the tweet appears to attribute the screenshot to The Lancet, that inference is not quite right.
The link provided in the tweet shows that the text forms part of "correspondence" authored by Carlos Franco-Paredes, an infectious diseases expert and associate professor at the University of Colorado, which was published by The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal in January.
In other words, the text forms part of a letter to the editor.
According to a spokeswoman for The Lancet Group, such letters represented the views of the author and "not necessarily the views of The Lancet journals".
Nick Talley, editor of the Medical Journal of Australia, concurred, telling Fact Check that while a journal would critically consider and review a letter before publishing it, such correspondence did not necessarily reflect the view of the journal.
"In terms of deciding whether to publish a letter or not, the journal editor makes a decision on whether the letter is of sufficient interest, or has something to say that is relevant," Laureate Professor Talley told Fact Check.
"But the letter is the author's commentary.
"In the end, the authors [of letters] take responsibility for what is said."
While Fact Check is not suggesting that the information contained in the letter shared by Mr Canavan is incorrect, it's worth noting that a page on The Lancet's website makes clear that such letters are not normally peer reviewed.
The spokeswoman for the journal confirmed that "the content authored by Franco-Paredes is a Letter to the Editor, and has not been peer reviewed, in line with our policy".
In addition to misrepresenting the authorship of the letter, the tweet shared by Senator Canavan also selectively highlights a portion of the correspondence while failing to include important context.
Dr Franco-Paredes's letter begins by acknowledging that "vaccine effectiveness studies [have] conclusively demonstrated the benefit of COVID-19 vaccines in reducing individual symptomatic and severe disease, resulting in reduced hospitalisations and intensive care unit admissions".
And while the letter does argue that there was evidence that vaccines didn't work to lessen the transmission of COVID-19, Dr Franco-Paredes does not argue for the removal of mandates.
Rather, that "vaccination status should not replace mitigation practices such as mask wearing, physical distancing, and contact-tracing investigations, even within highly vaccinated populations".
Well, that's a trucking lie
Thousands of truckers converged on the Canadian capital of Ottawa last weekend in protest against vaccine mandates, but reports that the convoy to the capital consisted of up to 50,000 trucks have been labelled as a "gross exaggeration" by fact checkers.
According to Snopes, a convoy of 50,000 trucks would stretch about 750 kilometres, and there was no evidence to suggest the convoy was "anywhere near" that long.
Rather, the fact checkers estimated trucks participating in the so-called "freedom convoy" — a response to new rules mandating vaccines for cross-border truckers — to number in the hundreds.
Other claims debunked by Snopes included suggestions (shared alongside miscaptioned historic footage) that American truckers were heading north to join the convoy from as far away as South Carolina, and that Indigenous people were participating in powwows in support of the cause.
The fact checkers also took aim at allegations that The Simpsons predicted the protest in 1999: a clip appearing to show Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau fleeing his office in response to a truck convoy was spliced together using footage from two episodes airing a decade apart.
Meanwhile, Fact checkers at AFP found that despite social media claims, the convoy had not landed a spot in the Guinness World Records for the largest parade of trucks; that record is currently held by the Tahya Misr Fund in Egypt, which managed to line up 480 trucks across 7.5 kilometres in 2020.
A spokeswoman for Guinness World Records added that, in order for an event to be considered a world record, an official application must be launched prior to the attempt, and specific protocols followed.
Finally, according to PolitiFact, a photo purporting to show Amish people supporting the convoy by following trucks in horse-and-buggy and feeding drivers actually shows Old Order Mennonites on their way to church.
Joni Mitchell joins streaming boycott; Spotify, Joe Rogan respond
Joni Mitchell has joined Neil Young in boycotting music streaming service Spotify in a protest over the platform's misinformation policies.
In a statement posted to her website, Mitchell says she decided to remove all her music from Spotify, claiming "irresponsible people" were "spreading lies that are costing people their lives".
"I stand in solidarity with Neil Young and the global scientific and medical communities on this issue."
In asking for his music to be removed from Spotify, Young pointed to the platform's deal with podcaster Joe Rogan, whose episodes regularly broadcast misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic.
Other musical artists, such as Young's former band member Graham Nash and soul singer Indie Arie, have also requested their music be removed from the streaming service.
Mitchell's announcement came as the head of the World Health Organisation, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, threw his support behind Young.
"@NeilYoungNYA thanks for standing up against misinformation and inaccuracies around #COVID19 vaccination," Dr Tedros wrote on Twitter.
"Public and private sector, in particular #socialmedia platforms, media, individuals — we all have a role to play to end this pandemic and infodemic."
Responding to the controversy, co-founder and CEO of Spotify Daniel Ek acknowledged the platform had "an obligation to do more to provide balance and access to widely accepted information from the medical and scientific communities guiding us through this unprecedented time".
In a statement published on the company's website, Mr Ek said Spotify's "long-standing Platform Rules" would be made public and that a content advisory warning would be added to any podcast episode featuring a discussion related to COVID-19.
Rogan, meanwhile, defended his podcast in a 10-minute video posted to Instagram in which he claimed there were "a lot of people that have a distorted perception of what I do".
In relation to two episodes featuring people known to spread COVID-19 misinformation, Rogan described his guests as "very highly credentialed, very intelligent, very accomplished people [that] have an opinion that's different from the mainstream narrative".
Noting that he "oftentimes… had no idea" what he was going to talk about until sitting down with his guests, Rogan said he would do his best in future to "balance things out" and was open to hosting "more experts with differing opinions right after I have the controversial ones".
In other news: Did the carbon tax destroy one in eight manufacturing jobs?
The Coalition has taken aim at Labor's plans to tackle climate change, warning voters in the run-up to the election that "they're always going to love a carbon tax that destroys jobs".
Pointing to the party's last term in office, the Minister for Industry, Energy and Emissions Reduction, Angus Taylor, claimed that "[w]hen the carbon tax went into place in this country, one in eight manufacturing jobs was destroyed", which would equate to12.5 per cent of the manufacturing workforce.
However, Fact Check this week found that claim to be wrong.
When the carbon tax went into place in 2012, manufacturing employed 947,500 people. By the time of its repeal two years later, that number had shrunk by 32,300 (3.4 per cent), with one in 29 workers affected.
Manufacturing job losses also continued in the years after the carbon tax was scrapped, though not on the scale claimed by Mr Taylor.
By contrast, roughly one in eight (127,000) jobs were lost across roughly six years of Labor government — a period that includes nearly five years before the carbon tax was introduced.
Importantly, experts told Fact Check that these job losses could not be solely attributed to Labor or the carbon tax. For one thing, they said, manufacturing as a share of total employment had been falling for decades.
Moreover, the downward trend would have been exacerbated during Labor's term by both declining investment in the sector and the global financial crisis.
Edited by Ellen McCutchan
Got a fact that needs checking? Tweet us @ABCFactCheck or send us an email at factcheck@rmit.edu.au
