Facts tell a different story on Covid misinformation, Facebook tells Joe Biden

After US President Joe Biden said that social media platforms like Facebook are killing people with Covid19 misinformation the social network giant has replied saying that facts tell a very different story to the one promoted by the administration in recent daysGuy Rosen VP of Integrity at Facebook said in a blog post on Saturday that at a time when Covid19 cases are rising in the US the Biden administration has chosen to blame a handful of American social media companiesWhile social media plays an important role in society it is clear that we need a whole of society approach to end this pandemic And facts not allegations should help inform that effort The fact is that vaccine acceptance among Facebook users in the US has increased Rosen arguedIn an interaction with the media on Friday Biden had directly criticised FacebookAlso read Joe Biden Social media platforms killing people with misinformationAsked for a message to social media platforms like Facebook Biden replied Theyre killing people The only pandemic we have is among the unvaccinated and theyre killing peopleRosen said that the Biden administration is calling for a whole of society approach to this challengeWe agree As a company we have devoted unprecedented resources to the fight against the pandemic pointing people to reliable information and helping them find and schedule vaccinations And we will continue to do so he postedAccording to him since January vaccine acceptance on the part of Facebook users in the US has increased by 1015 percentage points and racial and ethnic disparities in acceptance have shrunk considerablyThe data shows that 85 per cent of Facebook users in the US have been or want to be vaccinated against Covid19 President Bidens goal was for 70 per cent of Americans to be vaccinated by July 4 Facebook is not the reason this goal was missed Rosen saidThe social network said that since the pandemic began more than 2 billion people have viewed authoritative information about Covid19 and vaccines on Facebook This includes more than 33 million Americans using the vaccine finder tool to find out where to get a Covid19 vaccine and make an appointment to do soMore than 50 per cent of people in the US on Facebook have already seen someone use the Covid19 vaccine profile frames which we developed in collaboration with the US Department of Health and Human Services and the CDC Rosen informedLast week a report from US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called on social media platforms to tame accounts that share misinformationTheyve designed product features such as Like buttons that reward us for sharing emotionally charged content not accurate content And their algorithms tend to give us more of what we click on pulling us deeper and deeper into a well of misinformation he told reportersThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever