THE Election Year. The Year of AI elections. With over 60 countries heading to the polls this year, the world may look a little – or a lot – different by the end of 2024. How are newsrooms managing coverage and the significant challenge to sort fact from fiction?
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The diet hoax that eating high-alkaline foods could beat Covid-19 should have died down by now. After all, science experts and fact checkers across the globe had been quick to bust it when it came out.
But the fact that the erroneous claim has lingered on social media for nine months attests to the staying power of the disinfodemic that accompanies the pandemic.
Southeast Asia, in no way immune to the wealth and waves of misinformation spurred by the outbreak of the Sars-CoV-2 in late 2019, has partly contributed to the longevity of the lie. For one, many Facebook groups touting an alkaline diet as prevention or cure for Covid-19 were, as of late December, still spreading this from Indonesia, with a couple from Myanmar. What transpires in closed private messaging applications is anybody s guess.