Swine Flu: Does Twitter help or misinform? Share YOUR insights here!

Corvida Raven

The Swine Flu (Wikipedia) has been trending on Twitter for several days now. In fact, Twitter is where I first heard about Swine Flu. You can head to PandemicFlu.Gov for a comprehensive resources of U.S. government information being compiled about the outbreak.

For those that are unaware, CNN best summarizes Swine Flu as,

Swine influenza, or flu, is a contagious respiratory disease that affects pigs.

When the flu spreads person-to-person, instead of from animals to humans, it can continue to mutate, making it harder to treat or fight, because people have no natural immunity.

Symptoms include fever, runny nose, sore throat, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. Common seasonal flu kills 250,000 to 500,000 people every year worldwide, far more than the current outbreak of swine flu.

But there is no vaccine for the new disease, and little natural immunity, an expert said.

The Swine Flu was declared a health emergency of international concern on April 25th and propose some serious economic costs if a pandemic ensues.

Tracking Swine Flu Across The Web

Across the web, numerous sites, services, and companies are providing ways for users to keep track of Swine Flu developments. Facebook has put together a series of Swine Flu charts that maps the spread of discussions surrounding the epidemic. Google also has a service that estimates Flu activity across the U.S. known as  Flu Trends. There’s also a Google Maps timeline mashup of the wine Flu Outbreak and a Swine Flu Google Maps and Twitter mashup.

@HealthMap and @Veratech are keeping users updated with swine flu alerts on Twitter. Collecta has built a Swine Flu In Real Time search service that pulls from Twitter, Flickr and other resources. Here’s a Q&A on Swine Flu.   Be sure you stop and get Swine Flu Fun Facts too.

Twitter Reactions

On Twitter Search, the Swine Flu is tweeted about almost 20 times every 10 seconds! The reactions have been intense! If you’ve been using Twitter to stay updated on the epidemic, you may have been misinformed on numerous occasions. In fact, Twitter has caused some controversy over Swine Flu updates. The situation has led many to question once more, whether Twitter is as reliable for news as we think.

What do you think about all of this?

  • Has Twitter affected your reaction to Swine Flu?
  • Have you become more or less informed of Swine Flu through Twitter?
  • Were you ever misinformed about Swine Flu because of Twitter?
  • Has Twitter become a less or more reliable news source for you?

We’re looking forward to hearing your thoughts and great stories!

Category: Creative Twitter Uses, Unique Insights | Tags:

  • xtimu
    Twitter is great for testing the waters and seeing where people's minds are at.

    As far as real solid info? It's there but you have to sift. I've been checking with @dozonoff and @diseasegeek for updates and finding great links (I only found them after using twitter search and looking for keywords). I also found @ecarojr who did a zombie narrative around the time that the swine flu news was breaking. Twas highly amusing.

    The 80/20 rule doesn't apply here as more like 99% of the tweets are retweets or inner dialogue, but the 1% that has been either highly informative or entertaining are worth the time to find them.
  • jeff
    When you follow the right "person" or group it helps immensely! The CDC is the best
  • I don't think Twitter is the problem as much as the 24 hour news cycle. Cable news has space to fill and the swine flu is a low hanging fruit. It my Twitter circle, I've seen a lot more joke tweets about the swine flu than ones of genuine concern. Most of my friends are developers who are known to be a cynical lot.

    I don't find Twitter any more misinforming than old media. Twitter is a great source for breaking news like natural disasters but lacks the needed filter to be totally reliable for anything that requires analysis/debate.
  • I like your response James. Filters will definitely be something Twitter will need to work on when it comes to breaking the news. Do you have any suggestions on what types of filters Twitter could implement?
  • Maybe there could be some sort of algorithm that could take into account how often someone tweeted about a subject and how many times they were retweeted to determine authority.

    Or maybe adapting the love/hate/think/believe/feel/wish meme from twistori. Most of the hysterical tweets express some sort of fear. Maybe grade the tweets based on perceived emotion and the matter of fact ones rise to the top, the Chicken Littles fall to the bottom.
  • DUMBLONDE
    I WIKIPEDIA everything. Thats the first thing I did when I heard about Swine Flu.
  • The only problem with Wikipedia is that people can update it. If they are misinformed, they will be misinforming everyone else.
  • PorkyPig
    yes in my country the ppl using twitter to post false information and even a false account of an alleged victim of the swine flu saying that she didnt want to go to the hospital and wanted to infect us all!!!
  • mingyeow
    Haha, that is such a funny story! how many people believed that?
  • joedope
    Inform or misinform? IT AIN'T B&W!! Twitter is an aggregate of millions of twitterers. Some twitterers stray from fact. Some misinformation will take flight. However, to discourage fiction is unecessary and ineffective in pursuing truth.
    If you are a twitterer who is interested in accurate information, as I am, we need only to have some trustable source, and rely upon that. One trustable source's all that's required.

    We twitterers are youthful, but we are not stupid; we don't believe the bullshit, whether it be 140 characters or the State of the Union.
  • iaaxpage
    I had a conversation with some fellow twitters, I believe that twitter is a great tool for getting info on what is going on, you just have to pay attention to those who are actually being serious, keep themselves informed and share that information. There are others, must of us who believe twitter is just a big chat room, I am so sorry to tell you, it is not. It does not matter if you do not want to be serious, respectful or even if you care at all about others, the only recommendation I have is be responsible for what you share on twitter!
  • Sue
    I think it makes a difference if you are getting your flu information from your crazy cousin Larry who Twitters versus an actual reliable source like the CDC (who also Twitters). The news is making a bigger deal of the cousin Larry's than the people who actually follow him are. Example: I saw was a reporter pulling the wackiest tweets she could from the stream. How does she know anyone else took them seriously? And has anyone tried to get good information from a 24 hour news station? Every so often even cousin Larry gets face time there just to fill the entire day with something "newsy". Endemic in the system.
  • latina702
    More information is available at http:www.cdc.gov/swinflu/investigation.htm
  • Kwizim
    Twitter was where I first heard of it, and for that first "warning" it is great, for details I'd rely on other Internet sources.
  • mingyeow
    Great point. Thanks for the insight! :)
  • it was interesting to see how people ran scared about the swine flu.
  • I think Twitter, like any other form of communication, can be used to transmit erroneous information but that's the risk that we all take when we read blogs, get hurried texts, get live breaking news that doesn't have all the facts - but is just getting info out there at the speed of light to break the story first.

    With any information that is conveyed, it is up to the reader to pursue further information. Twitter messages and updates are subject to no less of a need to confirm etc. The benefit to getting info ASAP is that a "breaking situation is happening - seek further information" type of alert is a helpful immediate "head's up."
  • No, because I didn't rely on twitter for info.

    <rant>
    Your post is the VERY first info I've seen across ANY media (incl. TV & radio) which succintly summerises why Swine flu' might be a real problem, as opposed to an overblown hystercial reaction of the "nanny" generation, who expect that the common cold will be cured soon and that no-one will ever catch anything ever again from someone ele's couties.

    It seems to me that the panic is due to "no vacine" being available, because it hasn't "jumped" the species barrier before. It also appears, unlike Avian flu (rmember that last great pandemic?), where if you get it, chances are 60% plus, you could write your will, even with prompt treatment; that the mortality rate is going to zero, (apart from that poor mx child who didn't get to hospital for 3 weeks before treatment), IF you get treated quickly enough

    This begs my question. Why is there so much panic?

    Fine, be prepared, tell people what basic measures they can take to reduce transmission risks, (the usual basic hygiene we should allways follow: washing hands, using maks, covering coughs and sneezes with mouth, DON'T GO to work and DO GO to the Dr if symptoms appear), and yes, AS A LAST MEASURE, shut down work places and public spaces to stop it becoming a pandemic.

    But this level of panic? I blamce the media and weak governments who feel they have to be "seen to be doing something", for fear of polling/voter backlash, rather than any ACTUAL threat.

    The pharma companies who make flu tabs must be rubbing their hands with glee right now.

    Meanwhile, the opportunity to development a natural immunity to what may turn out to be no more virulent a strain of flu' than any other that circulates the globe every winter, is being short cicruited.
    </rant>

    Thank you. <cough> I feel much better now. ;-)
  • I hate it when I see the typos after I hit post. Douw!
  • Max Robespierre
    If you search on "swine flu," you're gonna get a lot of noise. Some facts, lots of crap. On the other hand, if you confine your search to WHO, Reuters, Sanjay Gupta, you're gonna get the straight skinny. The choice is yours.
  • I think twitter is great for sharing ideas and resources, but for credible information go to reliable sources like CDC for CNN!
  • I wonder if people will start to build a natural immunity to it once a lot of people get the weaker version of the swine flu. Cause I've seen a lot of people recover from it but they were already pretty healthy people.
  • Some good points raised in that post. Will be back to check for more.

    Cheers
    good-jobs.org, jewelryreview.net
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