Refer to the following websites and post a summary based on verified facts only. As a bonus, discuss the spread of false information happening during this national emergency. Can you trust everything you see on social media? How do you verify what information is true and false?

If you don’t live under a rock, you’re probably aware of the current global pandemic that is happening. COVID-19 is an illness deriving from a recently founded coronavirus. Not much is known about coronavirus; therefore, there is no cure. The best way to avoid getting COVID-19 is to practice prevention. This includes washing your hands, staying home except for essential needs, and social distancing. Community spread is apparent in many cities at this point and the only thing we can do to help is to try and stop the spread.

Social media is going crazy right now. Tons of false articles are being spread all over Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, etc. I believe that people feed into the panic. If someone posts some crazy headline that involves a lot of people dying or straight-up bad news, that post is going to thrive more than a positive one. I’ve seen some pretty crazy ones revolving COVID-19. For example, some people believe that Tom Hanks is a child predator and they are arresting him and a bunch of other celebrities that are involved secretly. Several questions here: Who is they? Tom Hanks???? No… Arresting them secretly? Another one I’ve seen a lot of is that once they declare martial law, all of our guns are getting taken away and we will be forced to live in a North Korea type environment? I will say that every time one of these has popped up on my timeline, I’ve deleted the person who shared in. I am not putting up with panic-inducing posts on my timeline about something serious like COVID-19. I feel that everyone needs to take this more seriously than they are. Someone from school has it and she’s young yet hers is pretty bad.

So no, you totally should not trust social media for information about anything, pandemics included. (Isn’t it so weird that we are living through a pandemic right now? I am still trying to fathom the reality of what’s happened.) Anyways, social media is a no go for accurate information. Verifying information can be difficult during this time when even news websites are posting exaggerated versions of stories. If you want to hear the truth and everything you need to know you should go to the CDC’s website. Everything is on there from prevention methods to what todo if you have it. They are legit, and I’m not listening to anything else. I just can’t believe that at this time people are trying to profit off of these crazy headlined articles instead of coming together to fight this pandemic. Ridiculous.

STAY HOME AND WASH YOUR HANDS PEOPLE.