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. 2022 Jun 6;9(7):ofac263.
doi: 10.1093/ofid/ofac263. eCollection 2022 Jul.

The Politicization of Ivermectin Tweets During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Marlon I Diaz  1 , John J Hanna  1 , Amy E Hughes  2 , Christoph U Lehmann  1 , Richard J Medford  1
Affiliations

The Politicization of Ivermectin Tweets During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Marlon I Diaz et al. Open Forum Infect Dis. .

Abstract

Background: We explore the ivermectin discourse and sentiment in the United States with a special focus on political leaning through the social media blogging site Twitter.

Methods: We used sentiment analysis and topic modeling to geospatially explore ivermectin Twitter discourse in the United States and compared it to the political leaning of a state based on the 2020 presidential election.

Results: All modeled topics were associated with a negative sentiment. Tweets originating from democratic leaning states were more likely to be negative.

Conclusions: Real-time analysis of social media content can identify public health concerns and guide timely public health interventions tackling disinformation.

Keywords: Twitter; disinformation; ivermectin; public opinion; social media.

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Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Sentiment analysis by US State. State boundaries represent 2020 presidential election results (red = republican, blue = democratic) and state fill represents the sentiment of coronavirus disease 2019-related tweets containing the word “Ivermectin” in the state.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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