There are some chiropractors across the United States that are using social media to spread fake and dangerous misinformation about the cause of COVID-19.
Eric Nepute, a chiropractor that is based in St. Louise, Missouri, went live on Facebook on April 6 to urge his followers to drink quinine and eat zinc to protect themselves from COVID-19. Nepute's video was captioned "Seriously. How much longer are we going to put up with all the BS..???" The said video has now been viewed more than 21 million times and has been shared over 185,000 times since last week.
Chiropractors fake information about coronavirus
Nepute stated in his livestream that quinine acts similar to hydrochloroquine. It acts as a transport chain to allow nutrients to get into the cells. Nepute advised those who are experiencing COVID-19 symptoms such as cold, cough and fever to get either quinine and Schweppes tonic water to combat the virus. He also encouraged people to share his video.
BuzzFeed News has reached out to Nepute for comment. As of April 6, the video contains a warning from Facebook's third-party fact-checkers that the video could contain partly false information.
A spokesperson for the American Chiropractic Association told BuzzFeed News that it was urging its members to not spread misinformation, especially during the coronavirus outbreak. According to the spokesperson, the ACA advises its members to follow the guidelines regarding the prevention of the coronavirus from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other credible sources and to share this information with their patients.
The spokesperson also stated that the ACA Board of Governors released a statement of clarifying Nepute's claims and to inform the public that there is no enough evidence to support that spinal adjustment, which is the method that chiropractors use to treat patients, could help prevent or even treat coronavirus.
Dangerous advice
Nepute's video has gone viral under a week, which alarms medical experts because his advice is not only wrong, it is also dangerous. A professor for infectious diseases at McGovern Medical School at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Dr. Luis Ostrosky, stated that the treatments Nepute mentioned in his viral video have no scientific basis.
According to Dr. Ostrosky, quinine has some similarities to hydrochloroquine, which U.S President Donald Trump and his supporters have touted as a miracle drug for COVID-19, despite medical experts debunking the claim.
Dr. Ostrosky stated that there has been some evidence that zinc lozenges could alleviate some symptoms of the common cold, which led some people to believe that it could combat COVID-19. Dr. Ostrosky added that medical experts should warn people about zinc as it causes severe gastrointestinal distress and that if it sounds too easy and too obvious it is probably not true.
Not only did Nepute's video went viral on Facebook, but it also went viral on Youtube, as it was viewed more than 2.8 million times, and it was shared on Twitter by QAnon-affiliated accounts.
An infectious disease researcher, Dr. Ravina Kullar, stated that she had seen Nepute's video and cautioned chiropractors not to use social media to spread misinformation. She added that medical experts and medical professionals are given the responsibility, to tell the truth as whatever comes out of their mouth, people are going to run with it.
