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| Facebook and Twitter block a Trump post comparing Corona and influenza |
Facebook and Twitter responded today, Tuesday, to messages from US President Donald Trump, stating that seasonal influenza is more deadly than the emerging coronavirus (Covid-19) COVID-19.
Facebook deleted the post and Twitter added a warning about incorrect information about the emerging corona virus, before users clicked on it to view it. Twitter also blocks the sharing of the Tweet.
A spokesperson for Twitter told CNBC, "With the standards that follow this public media interest, interaction with Tweets will be very limited."
In a post on Facebook and Twitter, Trump said, “Flu season is here! Lots of people die every year, and sometimes more than 100,000 people die. Even if we get the flu vaccine, let's go. Are we shutting down our country? No, we learned to live. Just like we learned to live with (Covid), it's much less deadly! ''
Data collected by Johns Hopkins University showed that the (Covid-19) epidemic has infected more than 7.45 million people and caused at least 210,195 deaths Tuesday morning. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an estimated 220,000 people will die from seasonal flu between 2019 and 2020.
A Facebook spokesperson said in a statement to CNBC: "We are removing incorrect information about the seriousness of (Covid-19) and we have now removed the post."
Before 11:00 AM EST, Facebook was the first person to respond to the post. Before Twitter added him a warning, Trump had been on hold for more than three hours. Trump's Facebook account has 31.5 million followers and 87 million followers on Twitter.
After Facebook deleted Trump's post and Twitter added a warning to the tweet, Trump posted a new tweet calling for the so-called "Section 230" of the "Communication Etiquette" to be removed from internet platforms. This allows them to edit and remove harmful content with impunity.
In May last year, Trump signed an executive order to remove some legal protections for social media companies. The move gives regulators an opportunity to sue companies like Facebook and Twitter over their policies regarding content monitoring of their platforms.