Rational sources of news during the coronavirus outbreak

This article is part of the guide Remote Working during COVID-19, How to ride out the coronavirus outbreak.

In this remote working guide we’ve looked at remote working tools, mental wellbeing and processes that work for remote working.

If you’ve not worked remotely before, then riding through this coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis will be particularly scary and challenging time. This is made even worse by the amount of fake news flying around or unsubstantiated claims.

Recommended news sources

Infographics

  • This amazing infographic by SCMP takes you through a variety of types of coronaviruses, how they spread, and how they affect the human body. It also contextualises COVID-19 with other coronaviruses that cause diseases such as Mers, Sars, and even the common cold.
  • In this visual capitalist infographic, they take you through the history of pandemics — all the way from the Black Death to how the current COVID-19 situation and uses historical examples to show how devastating pandemics can and have been.
  • The Washington Post have put together this interactive page to show you what happens when the virus spreads in a forced quarantine environment compared to social distancing is practiced, or even with no distancing at all.
  • Johns Hopkins University yet this fantastic real-time dashboard which has the latest numbers for COVID-19 cases, deaths, recoveries and much more and updates in real-time, so you always know you are getting the most up to date figures possible.
  • Our World in Data is a brilliant initiative led by economist Max Roser and their research page has all sorts of regularly updated stats and data to keep yourself informed.

Video Content

A report from Science Daily found that Misleading information in 1 in 4 most viewed YouTube COVID-19 videos in English, so it’s really important to fact check any information.

  • If you’re looking for non technical explanation of coronaviruses then this video from TedEX is a great place to start.
  • This animated video by Kurzgesagt provides a handy guide on how COVID-19 operates.
  • The World Health Organisation have put together this amazing video which takes a deep dive into exactly what COVID-19 is and why it is so dangerous.
  • If you’re looking for a detailed timeline, then The Guardian have put together a video on how the coronavirus changed the world in 3 months.
  • If you want to see exactly what happens to your body when you get COVID-19 then you should watch this video by Nucleus Media.
  • The Verge have also put together a video on how the virus is mutating.

Most trustworthy sources

A recent survey conducted by the University of Missouri’s Reynolds Journalism Institute analysed who the most and least trustworthy news sources are. Michael Kearney, an incoming professor at the University of Missouri, did statistical analysis of the 8,728 questionnaire responses.

Mentioned as trusted:

  1. The Economist
  2. Public television
  3. Reuters
  4. BBC
  5. NPR
  6. PBS
  7. The Guardian
  8. The Wall Street Journal
  9. Los Angeles Times
  10. The Dallas Morning News

Mentioned as not trusted:

  1. Occupy Democrats
  2. BuzzFeed
  3. Breitbart
  4. Social media
  5. Trump
  6. Infowars
  7. Yahoo
  8. Internet
  9. Huffington Post
  10. The Blaze

Keep this survey in mind when reading an article about Coronavirus.


We got this information out as quickly as possible and will be updating it over the coming days and weeks. If you have any other tools you want to add, please comment below or contribute to the cause and give your advice on remote working.

Stuart Logan

Stuart Logan

The CEO of Twine. Follow him on Twine and on Twitter @stuartlogan – As the Big Boss, Stuart spends his days in a large leather armchair, staring out over the Manchester skyline while smoking a cigar and plotting world domination. (He doesn’t really). Originally from Salisbury, UK, he studied computer science at Manchester University but was always keen to break into the exciting world of start-ups, and was involved in a number of ventures before finalising his plans for Twine. When not wearing his chief executive hat (metaphorically speaking) he enjoys harbouring unrealistic expectations for Manchester United’s future success and live music.