Not being correctly informed can be fatal
“Black people can’t die from COVID-19.”
“The virus was man-made for the purposes of population control.”
“The virus can be contained through herbal remedies.”
“5G radiation is the root cause of COVID-19.”
These were some of the theories circulating predominantly through social media a year ago when the coronavirus began spreading throughout America. The misinformation coming from, and aimed at, Black people was so intense that actor Idris Elba felt compelled to address the issue live on social media:
“My people, Black people, please understand [about] coronavirus: you can get it,” Elba said after contracting the disease in March last year. “There are so many stupid, ridiculous conspiracy theories about black people not being able to get it. That’s dumb, that’s stupid. That’s the quickest way to get more Black people killed.”
Black Americans have been disproportionately impacted by the coronavirus. According to a March 5, 2021 report by AMP Research Lab, of the more than 540,000 deaths in the U.S., more than 73,000 have been Black people. The “fake news” regarding COVID-19 has medical experts very concerned. Recently, the Annenberg Foundation hosted a webinar titled,“Covering Coronavirus: Fighting the Infodemic.”
In promoting the webinar, organizers wrote: “The potentially fatal dangers posed by the ‘infodemic’ are especially acute in communities of color, where long histories of racism and medical mistrust combined with a lack of trusted messengers have paved the way for COVID-19 misinformation and vaccine skepticism.”
Nila Johnson is familiar with the misinformation that’s been circulating in Black communities. Johnson has been in the healthcare / pharmaceutical industry for almost three decades as an executive and as an outreach coordinator for pharmaceutical companies like Mallinckrodt and Express Scripts. Although the “infodemic” is hard for her to tolerate, Johnson said she welcomes family and friends who come to her for advice or counsel on the pandemic and coronavirus vaccinations.
“Listen, I get it. We’ve had the Tuskegee experiment and all kinds of negative experiences in hospitals and in the military. I’ll give you a mulligan on that,” Johnson explained. “But the problem I have is when we start feeding into our own conspiracy theories, when we create this unbreakable circle.”
In June 2020, Brandi Collins-Dexter, a visiting fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center and a senior fellow at Color Of Change, published “Canaries in the Coal Mine: COVID-19 Misinformation and Black Communities.” Tracking misinformation since the beginning of the crisis, Collins-Dexter reported that the Black online community was “awash in medical misinformation” even as Black people were disproportionately dying from the virus.
This is the major point Johnson emphasizes when she discusses COVID-19:
“First, let’s deal with some facts. We’re disproportionately dying from this disease. And that’s because we’re pulling up the rear on health issues like diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity and a host of other socio / economic reasons,” Johnson stressed. “So, it should come as no surprise that when the disease hit our shores, it would hit us super hard. It’s not just the culture, we’ve always come up last when it comes to healthcare. Now we need to talk about how we’re going to get better.”
Johnson said she’s also heard or read speculations and fears online about the COVID-19 vaccinations. Some of the most popular misconceptions are that vaccines increase the risk of autism or catching the coronavirus; vaccines can overload the immune system; vaccines are used to microchip people; and even, Black people aren’t getting the same vaccinations as white Americans.
Johnson always advocates a fact-based approach, urging people to also use the internet to fact-check false or misleading claims. She’s debated people who are suspect of how quick the country came up with a vaccine for the virus:
“Many people don’t realize that research and development on related viruses was already in process, that’s why they were able to come up with a vaccine so quickly.”
When asked about the fears of different vaccines for different races, Johnson flatly declared it as “nonsense”:
“I rely on my professional and personal expertise,” Johnson responded. “First, let’s look at supply & demand. The supply is not keeping up with demand. Companies are trying to produce as much as they can as quickly as they can for everybody, be they Black, white, or purple. Do you really think they’ve got time to deliver vaccines based on race?”
Johnson compares a lot of modern-day fears regarding the pandemic and vaccinations to other pandemics like polio on the 1950s and AIDs in the 1980s:
“I remember as a little girl when they vaccinated the whole class for polio. Some of the same fears and talking points today were circulating about the AIDS virus. People were saying it was man-made disease created to decrease the African population and so forth. It wasn’t a Black or white issue back then. Now, people can live with AIDS. And that’s because of research and development.”
Johnson said the concerns she hears from family and friends about COVID-19 or vaccinations her comments end on the same note:
“I tell them, ‘a healthy country is a wealthy country.’ It goes beyond race. This country can’t survive without its worker bees. The federal government is providing vaccination services for free. We all need to get vaccinated to get this thing under control. So, do it!”
