U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called on Big Tech to remove Joe Rogan’s podcast because of so-called COVID-19 “misinformation,” on Tuesday.
Murthy was discussing what he considered to be COVID-19 “misinformation” on social media platforms with MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski. Brzezinski asked Murthy what he thought of Rogan’s podcast, which reached 11 million people per episode. Rogan has been criticized for promoting alternative treatments for COVID-19.
“What do you think are the best ways to push back on misinformation about COVID that continues to be aggressively pushed, whether it be Joe Rogan’s podcast or all over Facebook?” Brzezinski asked Murthy, according to The Blaze.
“We can have the best science available, we can have the best public health expertise available. It won’t help people if they don’t have access to accurate information,” Murthy said. Adding: “People have the right to make their own decisions, but they also have the right to have accurate information to make that decision with.”
He said that Big Tech has an “important role to play” since they are the “predominant places where we’re seeing misinformation spread.”
Murthy said that Big Tech platforms like Facebook and Twitter should do more to remove alleged “misinformation” online. He said, however, that change should be the responsibility of the platforms themselves, not the government.
“This not just about what the government can do,” he said, “this is about companies and individuals recognizing that the only way we get past misinformation is if we are careful about what we say and use the power that we have to limit the spread of misinformation.”
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