"Conspiracy theorists, wellness influencers, and grifters have already started promoting wild claims about the hantavirus outbreak that began aboard the MV Hondius, a cruise ship on the Atlantic. Some conspiracy theorists compared the outbreak to the Covid-19 pandemic, claiming it was another effort to control the global population, while others pushed a false narrative that the Covid-19 vaccine caused hantavirus. Many others promoted ivermectin as a treatment, using the incident as a way to sell emergency medical kits featuring the antiparasitic drug typically used as a horse dewormer."
""One of the most striking shifts since the Covid pandemic is how rapidly misinformation narratives now organize themselves around emerging outbreaks," Katrine Wallace, an epidemiologist at University of Illinois Chicago School of Public Health, tells WIRED. "Within hours of the first hantavirus headlines, social media accounts were already promoting ivermectin, attributing the outbreak to Covid vaccines, and warning about a hantavirus vaccine that does not exist. The claims themselves were often contradictory, but that contradiction no longer appears to limit their spread.""
"Once the hantavirus outbreak started making headlines around the world, conspiracy theorists and grifters jumped into action, spreading dangerously ill-informed claims and, of course, trying to sell people ivermectin. "Ivermectin should work against it," Mary Talley Bowden wrote on X. Bowden, a doctor, is a prominent promoter of medical misinfor"
A hantavirus outbreak aboard the MV Hondius cruise ship in the Atlantic triggered rapid misinformation campaigns. Conspiracy theorists compared the outbreak to Covid-19 and claimed it was meant to control the global population. Others falsely claimed Covid-19 vaccines caused hantavirus. Some promoted ivermectin as a treatment and used the incident to sell emergency medical kits containing the antiparasitic drug. Later, some of the same accounts pushed antisemitic claims that the incident was a false flag orchestrated by Israel. The misinformation spread quickly after initial headlines, with contradictory claims still circulating widely and limiting their ability to prevent harm.
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