Coronavirus Disease-2019 Conspiracy Theories are Alive and Breathing on the Internet

Abstract

The more detailed origin stories of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) and the coronavirus disease2019 (COVID-19) vaccines are both unknown to the layperson. These unknowns serve as opportunities for misinformation messaging to the layperson. How did pharmaceutical companies create a vaccine within a matter of months to a year for a relatively new virus? Were aborted fetal cells used to make the COVID vaccines? What if there are long-term side COVID-19 vaccine effects not yet known to scientists and the public? While the internet, without a fact-checker and combined with opportunity and individual attitudes and information preferences, may flourish with misinformation and conspiracy theories. Scientists have a professional duty to publish evidence-based data in all pursuits, but recently the scientific community has spent much time educating the public in hopes of neutralizing many of the COVID fallacies we see every day on social media.