Drugs and Infodemic

Abstract

The first year of the COVID-19 pandemic brought critical scientific advances at speeds never seen before. The information from scientific studies won the world in news and social media. However, the spread of fake news provided an infodemic among a still unknown disease and no scientifically proven treatment. The present study aimed to evaluate the content and type of information on drugs indicated for the treatment of COVID-19 without scientific evidence in Brazilian social media. Two social media, Instagram and Twitter, were selected to search for drug information related to the prevention or treatment of COVID-19. The research was carried out using hashtags: #chloroquine, #hydroxychloroquine, #ivermectin, and #nitazoxanide for Portuguese publications in March 2020 and 2021. Descriptive statistic was used to present the quantitative data. In 2020, chloroquine was the drug with the highest number of publications in both social networks analyzed. The publications addressed the evidence of drug use and shortages, and the vast majority were considered correct information. While in 2021, ivermectin was the predominant drug cited on Instagram, while chloroquine was the most published on Twitter. Both drugs were related to “early treatment” and political and ideological content, classified as mostly disinformation. Thus, it is necessary to reinforce these social media guidelines to reduce the spread of health disinformation to the population. At the same time, health education in digital media is supported to ensure that the best information on management and care for COVID-19 reaches people and promotes their quality of life.