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In addition to misinformation regarding COVID-19, the video-sharing giant will also ban false claims about influenza and measles vaccines.
The social media giant announced that YouTube will block all anti-vaccine content, going beyond its ban on false information about the COVID-19 vaccine, including materials containing misinformation about other approved vaccines.
YouTube said on Wednesday that the expanded policy will apply to “vaccinations that are currently approved and confirmed to be safe and effective by local health authorities and the World Health Organization (WHO).”
The new policy will also remove false claims about routine immunizations against diseases such as measles, hepatitis B and influenza from YouTube.
This will include cases where video bloggers posting content on the platform claim that approved vaccines do not work, or mistakenly link them to chronic health effects.
A YouTube spokesperson said that the online video company also banned channels related to several well-known anti-vaccine activists, including Robert F Kennedy Jr and Joseph Mercola.
A news email on the Mercola website said in a statement: “We are united all over the world. We will not live in fear. We will stand together and restore our freedom.”
Kennedy is a member of a famous political family in the United States. He said in a statement: “There is no example in history that censorship and secrecy promote democracy or public health.”
RT accused of violation
YouTube said that since last year, it has removed more than 130,000 videos that violated its COVID-19 vaccine policy.
On Tuesday, the video platform told German media that it had blocked the German-language channel of the Russian state broadcaster RT for violating its COVID-19 misinformation guidelines.
YouTube stated that it had issued a warning to RT before closing the two channels, but the move triggered Moscow’s threat to block the video site.
It is not the only social media giant struggling to deal with the spread of COVID-19 conspiracy theories and medical misinformation.
On Monday, people gathered in New York City to protest the mandatory coronavirus disease vaccine and vaccine passport [David Delgado/Reuters]Facebook restarted its efforts to deal with violence and conspiracy this month, first by shutting down a German network that spread COVID-19 misinformation.
YouTube stated that content that “wrongly stated that the approved vaccine will cause autism, cancer or infertility, or that the substance in the vaccine can track the vaccinated person” will be deleted.
“As with any major update, it will take time for our system to fully enforce law enforcement,” YouTube added.
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