Fact Check: Did WHO confirm Coronavirus is airborne and can be transmitted through air?

Claim: WHO claims Coronavirus is airborne

Rating: False

What’s the rumour about? 

• Social media users creating a misunderstanding by quoting an article and interpreting it wrongly. This has caused people to generate some unsupported assumptions. 
• Social media recently saw some message forwards that had combined facts with misunderstandings.
• The message forwards state that - Coronavirus is an airborne virus and can even stay in the air for more than 8 hours.
• The message was shared with a link to the CNBC article with the title 'WHO considers ‘airborne precautions’ for medical staff after study shows coronavirus can survive in air.’

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WHO coronavirus report: Mythbusters

Image courtesy: WHO (all the three pictorials are sourced from WHO)

Republic World's fact check about the COVID-19 airborne confusion

• The statement is false according to the fact check performed by the Republic World team. The claims are still unproven by the WHO officials. 
• Some social media users have misquoted the article and have concluded that the Coronavirus can stay in the air for more than 8 hours, though it is not confirmed by WHO as of yet. 
• WHO mentioned a few days earlier that they came across a study which showed that the virus can survive in the air for a longer time in certain environmental conditions like heat and humidity.
• After that, WHO stated that they are considering taking additional airborne precautions for their medical staff dealing with the virus affected patients.
• Even the regional director of WHO South-East Asia, Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh took to Twitter three days back to provide an answer to the people. 

• Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, head of WHO’s emerging diseases and zoonosis unit, told in an interview that several studies are being conducted to check out the environmental conditions in which the Coronavirus can persist for a longer time.
• This is why the medical staff are recommended to wear N95 masks which filter out 95% of all liquid or airborne particles. Plus it would also help the medical staff to stay safe when they are performing the aerosol-generating procedure. 
• The director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Robert Redfield, told that they are extensively studying the time period of the survival of the virus when it stays in the air or on inanimate objects. For example, on hard surfaces like copper and steel, the virus survives for about two hours. But it survives longer on cardboard and plastic.
• The WHO Director-General advised all countries to keep testing every suspected case to find more about this virus. They have not stated anywhere the amount of time the COVID-19 can survive in the air, thus clearing all assumptions. 

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Priyanka Chopra's IG Live gives a WHO coronavirus update

Here is actor Priyanka Chopra asking some questions that the Indians were confused about. She asked her fans to write all the health-related questions to get the answers from WHO General-Director Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s Technical Lead. 

Image courtesy: Priyanka Chopra Instagram

Here are the questions that the WHO officials answered on Priyanka Chopra's IG live. 

• Dr Maria said that people with pre-existing conditions should make sure that they stay at home and not go out. She also said that young people are not invincible from the virus outbreak and thus should follow lockdown rules and stay at home. 
• Dr Maria stated that the virus is NOT airborne. She urged everyone to follow strict guidelines when it comes to washing their hands and maintaining personal hygiene.
• Priyanka Chopra read one of her questions from her Instagram Live and asked whether a person who has been infected and recovered from the virus get infected again? To this Dr, Maria said that the data is still being gathered regarding the same. 
• When asked about whether the virus can thrive or weaken at specific temperatures, Dr Maria replied that it is still early to answer to those questions as the studies are still taking place, and there is no definitive answer to that yet. 
• Dr Tedros replied that the vaccine could be expected within 1 - 1.5 years. 

What Google Trends data for the "Coronavirus is airborne?" rumour tells us

The Google trends of the recent rumour concerning Coronavirus is about a WHO report that tells whether the virus can be transmitted through the air. According to the Google trends data, the rumour saw a hike on March 20 while after a few days, people became more curious to know about this fact and thus on March 23, the highest number of people searched for "Coronavirus being airborne?"

Image courtesy: Google Trends

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Keywords being searched 

Here are what the people are searching all around the world to know whether WHO has reported Coronavirus as airborne now. Even the number of people searching the keywords are mentioned in percentage form. 

Image courtesy: Google Trends

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