ESHS/HSS Annual Meeting

Going viral: Epidemiological reasoning and the making of the COVID-19 infodemic

• In Event: Epidemiology Unbound 3

English Abstract

This paper explores how epidemiological reasoning shaped the development and interpretation of the COVID-19 pandemic, the first major health crisis to unfold in a fully digital world. Rapidly shifting guidance, scientific uncertainty, and governments’ hesitation to make unpopular or controversial decisions backed by science (Engelmann et al., 2022; McCloud et al., 2024; Neuberger & Miller, 2021) encountered social media spaces, optimised for speed, ‘viral’ content, and emotional engagement (Rodney & Hafner, 2012; van der Linden, 2022). As key health messages were reframed, challenged, or misunderstood, institutional trust was eroded (Engelmann et al., 2022; Kawachi & Ransome, 2024), and a global infodemic took form as a result of this health communication crisis.
Drawing from critical media studies and sociotechnical perspectives, the paper traces how epidemiological concepts such as viral spread, exposure, and contagion have been used online, outside of clinical contexts, for global health communication strategies and to shape preventative behaviours. Despite significant efforts, these strategies struggled to effectively engage with platform-specific dynamics that were shaping how people engaged with public health messaging. Social media fostered emotionally charged disinformation, while parasocial relationships with digital communicators often played a greater role in building credibility than institutional authority (Myrick and Willoughby, 2021; Chung & Goebert, 2023).
In this paper I argue that the COVID-19 infodemic was not only the result of an overflow of information, but also a product of widespread adoption of epidemiological reasoning beyond medicine, revealing its affordances and limits, digitally mediating trust and authority online.

Author

• Giulia Villanucci