The Ministry of Information partners with WHO, UNICEF, and UNDP to counter the spread of COVID-19 misinformation in Lebanon
22 April 2020
- As the Lebanese government battles the COVID-19 pandemic, a dangerous epidemic of misinformation has been circulating through different communication channels and in communities since the beginning of the outbreak preventing people to heed official health warnings.
- To counter the growing scourge of fake news, the Ministry of Information is taking further steps and announced today a new communications response initiative in partnership with WHO, UNICEF and UNDP to flood media and social media with facts and science.
Minister of Information, Dr. Manal Abdel Samad stressed on the many risks linked to fake news: “yesterday, the drop of the coronavirus infections was accompanied by a very dangerous rumour, which is the end of the Corona pandemic in Lebanon. This is a simple sample of misinformation that creates confusion and false hope. Today we announce a new partnership with the UN organizations: World Health Organization, UNICEF, the United Nations Development Program, to tackle the threat of fake news”.
She added: "our partnership includes several phases: a media campaign that we launched today along with a rumour log and at a later stage a website will be launched to verify information."
(To read the text in its entirety, please download the PDF below)
UN entities involved in this initiative
Goals we are supporting through this initiative
