Truth and Lies about Corona Virus

1. Coronavirus Myths Busted: Separating Truth From
Lies And Hoaxes
surrahlukesxo
Mar 20 · 7 min read
These are confusing times for America as the battle to slow the spread of the new
coronavirus is fought on multiple fronts, including a skirmish to nd the truth.
DISCOVER THE TRUTH
Many of the hoaxes circulating online and through social media con ate grains of truth
and rumor, making the information conveyed quasi-plausible in an atmosphere of
confusion and fear. Some of the pieces of “information” circulating are outright lies.
Patch looked at some of the most pervasive rumors, and here is the truth based on the
most currently available information.
Anyone can publish on Medium per our Policies, but we don’t fact-check every story. For
more info about the coronavirus, see cdc.gov.

2. CLAIM: In various iterations of this, text messages people are forwarding to their
friends, families and business networks spread information supposedly from someone
who just left a two-hour brie ng with the CIA and highly placed government o cials.
The message warns people to stock up on everything they’ll need for two weeks because
a national lockdown or quarantine is coming from President Donald Trump within 48 to
72 hours.
FALSE: This is false — as of Friday’s statements by the president. Trump said that he
was not currently considering a national lockdown.
The White House’s National Security Council also debunked the national lockdown
rumor in a tweet: “Text message rumors of a national #quarantine are FAKE. There is no
national lockdown.”
What’s true is that when Trump declared a national emergency, he invoked the Sta ord
Act, usually used to trigger federal aid to states in natural disasters and other times of
crisis. Importantly, the Sta ord Act does not give the federal government the authority
to impose mandatory quarantines. The administration also closed the nation’s borders
to people traveling from high-risk countries, except for U.S. citizens coming home, but
that wasn’t a lockdown. Neither is the urgent recommendation by public health o cials
that Americans hunker down in their homes for the next 15 days.
That doesn’t mean a national shelter-in-place order is impossible, and Patch will alert
you if that becomes the case.
CLAIM: Cities and counties across the country have issued shelter-in-place orders to
help prevent the community spread of the virus. National Guard troops have been
deployed, and residents of these areas are living under martial law.
FALSE: That claim is Part 2 of the hoax detailed above. It’s true National Guard troops
have been deployed to some areas with shelter-in-place orders; the soldiers aren’t
acting as police enforcing civil law, though. Rather, their duties include providing
humanitarian aid, closing critical service gaps and building temporary hospitals.
Martial law is a rarely used legal power that isn’t speci cally written into the
Constitution, and it’s been contentious in the handful of times the military has been
used to enforce the law because police and courts are for some reason unable to
function.
DISCOVER THE TRUTH
CLAIM: The coronavirus can be spread in food.
LIKELY FALSE: The Food and Drug Administration says there is currently no
evidence to support transmission of the coronavirus associated with food, but says for
general food safety, it’s important to wash your hands with soap and water for 20
seconds before handling food.
In general, because of poor survivability of these coronaviruses on surfaces, there is
likely very low risk of spread from food products or packaging that are shipped over a
period of days or weeks at ambient, refrigerated, or frozen temperatures, the FDA says.
You should always handle and prepare food safely, including keeping raw meat separate

3. from other foods, refrigerating perishable foods, and cooking meat to the right
temperature to kill harmful germs. See CDC’s Food Safety site for more information.
CLAIM: The coronavirus remains alive for hours or days on plastic and metal surfaces.
LIKELY TRUE: A team of researchers from the National Institutes of Health, Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention, University of California-Los Angeles and Princeton
University found the coronavirus can last for hours or days on some surfaces. The study
found it lasts:
Up to three hours in aerosols;
Up to four hours on copper;
Up to 24 hours on cardboard;
Up to two or three days on plastic and stainless steel.
The researchers said their ndings show that secondary cases of the new coronavirus —
those not associated with travel — occur in communities rather than health care
settings, although they emphasized health care facilities are vulnerable to the spread of
the virus and that the stability of the virus in aerosols contributes to the spread of the
virus.
CLAIM: Home remedies such as drinking plenty of water and gargling with vinegar
and warm salt water will stop the virus from traveling into the lungs, and rinsing the
nose with saline will speed recovery.
FALSE: The World Health Organization addressed this and other false coronavirus
medical advice circulated on social media and says there’s no evidence saline nasal
rinses o er any protection against a coronavirus infection.
“There is some limited evidence that regularly rinsing the nose with saline can help
people recover more quickly from the common cold,” the agency said. “However,
regularly rinsing the nose has not been shown to prevent respiratory infections.”
It’s true that increasing water intake during respiratory and other illnesses is important
to prevent dehydration, and it’s no di erent with COVID-19. Gargling with home
remedies has no e ect on the illness, according to the fact-checking site Snopes.
DISCOVER THE TRUTH
CLAIM: If you can hold your breath for 10 seconds without coughing, you haven’t
been infected by the coronavirus.
FALSE: Posts that circulated on social media and in emails claiming the reliability of
the breath test were falsely attributed to a member of the Stanford Health Care board,
but Stanford spokeswoman Lisa Kim told CNN the post contains dangerous, inaccurate
information.
CLAIM: Frequently washing hands under hot soapy water for at least 20 seconds —
taking care to wash between ngers, around cuticles and under ngernails — o ers the
best protection against the new coronavirus, but when that’s impossible to do, a 60
percent alcohol-based hand sanitizer is almost as e ective.

4. TRUE: That’s true, though it’s not the only protection against the new coronavirus. The
CDC’s recommendation is to avoid being exposed in the rst place, by limiting contact
with others and meeting socially in groups of 10 or fewer; maintaining a distance of at
least 6 feet between people; coughing and sneezing into a tissue and immediately
disposing of it or, as an alternative, sneezing into your elbow; avoid touching eyes, nose
and mouth with unwashed hands; and regularly wiping down frequently touched
surfaces — for example, countertops, door handles, light switches, television remotes,
toilet and bathroom xtures.
CLAIM: Although people age 60 and older appear to be most vulnerable to the
coronavirus illness and most often show symptoms, younger people who are
asymptomatic can unknowingly carry and spread the virus and should also follow the
government’s social distancing recommendations.
TRUE: Researchers don’t know if some people are more immune than others, but they
do know no one is completely immune. The coronavirus is still in the early stages in the
United States, but what public health o cials know so far is that more than a third of
patients who have been hospitalized so far are between the ages of 20 and 54.
A new CDC report says that Americans of all ages are being seriously sickened by the
coronavirus. It’s true that COVID-19 patients in their 70s, 80s and 90s have the most risk
of dying, but the report showed 38 percent of the 508 patients hospitalized have been
between the ages of 20 and 54. And nearly half of the 121 patients who were admitted
to intensive care units were adults under 65.
Public health o cials have implored millennials and others who aren’t in a high risk
group to behave as if they are. White House coronavirus coordinator Dr. Deborah Brix
says millennials can play a key role in promoting the urgency of the situation to their
peers.
CLAIM: Hundreds of nurses were furloughed at seven Connecticut hospitals because
they couldn’t be tested for the new coronavirus.
FALSE: Though the governor of Connecticut claimed that on a national television
broadcast, it’s not true.
CLAIM: America will run out of toilet paper before the coronavirus pandemic is over.
FALSE: Some people are panic-buying toilet paper, and that’s what’s contributing to
empty toilet paper aisles in the United States and around the world. U.S. toilet paper
makers are ramping up production to ensure an ample supply of toilet paper.
The panic buying contributed to a 60 percent increase in toilet paper sales in the week
ending March 7, according to Nielsen data, and that has made TP more expensive.
CLAIM: The spread of the coronavirus from China to the rest of the world has been
accompanied by a rise in racism and xenophobia against Asians.
TRUE: Asian Americans Advancing Justice and other groups report dozens of incidents
of hate speech and physical attacks directed at Asians, and calls them reminiscent of the
1800s pejorative “yellow peril,” pinned on Chinese Americans, suggesting they
represented an existential threat to the Western world.
John C. Yang, who heads the group, told The Associated Press that “words matter” and

5. John C. Yang, who heads the group, told The Associated Press that “words matter” and
“in reality, Chinese are not more genetically prone to transmit the virus. What we all
need to do is focus on our public health.”
When the World Health Organization named the illness caused by coronavirus COVID-
19, o cials said they were guarding against stigmatism and warned against the
potential for racial pro ling. Trump has been criticized for repeated references to the
“Chinese virus” in news conferences.
“This is a time for solidarity, this is a time for facts, this is a time to move forward
together, to ght this virus together. There is no blame in this,” said Dr. Mike Ryan,
executive director of the WHO’s emergencies program. “All we need now is to identify
the things we need to do to move forward quickly, with speed and to avoid any
indication of ethnic or other associations with this virus.”
DISCOVER THE TRUTH
By Beth Dalbey, Patch Sta
Originally published at https://patch.com on March 20, 2020.
Coronavirus Covid 19 Pandemic
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