U.S. trust in virus information down, poll says
Family doctor is most trusted, social media the least trusted source
Americans have lost trust across the board in the people and institutions informing them about the coronavirus since the beginning of the pandemic, according to a new poll from The Associated PressNORC Center for Public Affairs Research and USAFacts.
The poll finds that the percentage of people saying they trust COVID -19 information from their state or local governments, the news media, social media and their friends and family has dropped significantly compared to similar ques
tions in April. A large chunk of Americans say they find it hard to know if coronavirus information is accurate.
Just 16 per cent say they trust coronavirus information from
U.S. President Donald Trump a great deal or quite a bit, down from 23 per cent in April. And 64 per cent now say they trust Trump only a little or not at all on COVID-19. Only social media, at 72 per cent, is less trusted.
Even though Paula Randolph opposes the Republican president, she said she trusted the White House on coronavirus information when the pandemic started.
“Because of the history of the presidency of the United States, it was no matter what, they’ll tell us the facts,” said Randolph, a 49-year-old disabled woman in Dixon, Mo. “It became a circus, and I no longer trust it.”
She even remembers the day she lost trust in the White House on the coronavirus: April 30. Trump, who by that point had been promoting an anti-malaria drug unproven on COVID-19, had a news conference on the pandemic that day, calling his response to the virus “really spectacular.”
The family doctor ranks highest when it comes to whom Americans trust for information about the coronavirus, with 53 per cent saying they trust their health provider a great deal or quite a bit. After their doctors, 36 per cent said they have high trust in federal health officials at agencies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration, 26 per cent in state or local governments, 18 per cent in news media, 17 per cent in family and friends, 16 per cent in Trump, 12 per cent in search engines and just six per cent in social media.
Experts in health, science and political communication said they see three reasons for the drop in trust: fear, politics and the public watching science messily forming in real time.