- Where did the coronavirus come from? A new Pew poll finds that roughly 1 in 3 Americans think it doesn’t have a natural origin — that, in fact, it was created in a lab.
- Infectious disease experts, however, say the most likely origin is that the virus is naturally occurring and made the species jump itself from animals to humans.
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As the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak has spread, so, too, has misinformation about the deadly virus thrived online — partly as a function of the knowledge gap, since so little about the virus was known at the outset.
This is the reason, for example, for a spate of attacks on 5G infrastructure in places like the UK, where a conspiracy theory that 5G is somehow linked to the virus has thrived. And in spite of explanations from infectious disease experts that point to a natural origin, almost 30% of Americans who responded to a new Pew poll said they think the virus was manmade and originated in a lab. Breaking that number down even more, almost a fourth of respondents to this Pew Research Center survey conducted from March 10 to 16 said they think the virus was developed intentionally in a lab, while 6% think it was accidentally created in a lab.
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Poll: Roughly 1 in 3 Americans think the coronavirus was made in a lab originally appeared on BGR.com on Mon, 13 Apr 2020 at 17:03:27 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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