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Why do epidemics breed conspiracy theories? And what do scientists say?
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As conspiracy theories go, the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic offered all the right ingredients. Scientists think the virus jumped from wild animals into humans, likely in late 2019 in the bustling Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market of Wuhan, central China.
But it just so happens that a half-hour drive from that market, across the Yangtze River, is China’s highest-security biosafety laboratory. At the Wuhan Institute of Virology, hazard suits are de rigueur for scientists studying some of the world’s most dangerous diseases.
Within days of news that a new deadly coronavirus had been identified in humans, unfounded claims that it was really a bioweapon or escaped experiment from this Wuhan lab were spreading nearly as fast as the virus itself.
Now the world is in the grip of its next pandemic, this time in the golden age of social media, and conspiracy theorists are in their element. But why do pandemics breed conspiracy theories? What are scientists saying? And is there any right way to argue with a conspiracy theorist?
Scientists at the epidemiological laboratory in Wuhan's Institute of Virology. Credit:AFP
What are the theories about COVID-19?
Some theories claim that COVID-19 is a population-control scheme or a top-secret spy operation gone wrong. Others question whether it exists at all or point to similar (but unrelated) patents for coronavirus vaccines as a sign it's all a cash grab by big pharmaceutical companies. More than one breathless Youtuber has blamed Wuhan’s recent rollout of 5G Wi-Fi.
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Politicians from the US, Iran, South America and even China have ignore ..
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