Jakarta – The US government's act of flagging several posts on the Facebook platform, as misinformation about COVID-19, is considered an attempt to spy on its people. The accusations angered Joe Biden.
The US president called social media platforms such as Facebook "killing people", for allowing misinformation about COVID-19 to circulate on his social media platforms.
Biden told reporters at the White House on Friday, July 16, before he left for the weekend at Camp David. The reporters asked for the Democratic president's response to the government's actions on some posts on social media.
“They kill people. I mean really," Biden said. “Look, the only pandemic we have is among (people) who are not vaccinated. They (Facebook) kill people."
Facebook hit back at Biden's comments, saying that more than three million people had used the vaccine search service on its platform. "We will not be bothered by allegations that are not supported by facts," said Facebook spokesman Dani Lever.
"The fact is that more than 2 billion people have seen official information about COVID-19 and vaccines on FB," he added.
The previous day the White House confirmed that it had stepped up tracking of various misinformation about COVID-19. The post was mainly related to vaccinations that were deemed unnecessary. The tracking comes as the US government tries to deal with the country's slowing vaccination rate in recent months.
On the other hand, positive cases also continue to soar across the country. The White House flagged misleading posts on Facebook for removal by the platform's administrators.
Jen Psaki, a White House spokeswoman, said about 12 people were thought to be responsible for 65 percent of anti-vaccine misinformation on social media platforms.
"All of them remain active on Facebook, even some of them are banned on other platforms, including those owned by Facebook," he said on Thursday, July 15.
On Friday, July 16, Jen Psaki was questioned again and again about the practice of tagging posts on Facebook, as an attempt to spy on the American people.
"That's an inaccurate question," answered Psaki. He insisted that the White House also engage in similar communications with the media in the US to keep their reporting straight.
Currently COVID-19 cases in the US are exploding again, which makes more and more victims who have to be hospitalized, and deaths across the US are increasing again.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in the past seven days an average of 26,300 new cases have emerged. This number jumped almost 70 percent. The cases are concentrated among people who have not been vaccinated.
This fact sparked a new push for vaccination programs to be re-invigorated and ensured that accurate information about vaccines was properly disseminated. Not the other way around.
“What we mean is that there is information that causes people not to use vaccines and as a result people die. We have a responsibility to public health issues to raise the issue,” said Psaki.
And he insists that social media platforms are free to do what they like with information provided by the government. "We didn't drop anything," he said. 'We're not blocking anything.'
“Facebook, and any private sector company, must make decisions about what information should be on their platforms,” Psaki said. He warned of the great danger if the government's warnings were ignored. “This is life and death. This is a public health issue," Psaki . said
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