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U.S. NEWS Thursday 16 april 2020
To love and to cherish: Nurse couple unites to fight virus

Continued from Front gery patients, any of whom Their patients have been during the drive to work. He says they don’t worry
may have COVID-19. in car crashes, or needed They disagreed about much about getting sick,
It strikes a chord “because They didn’t think twice brain surgery because of a what to play on the car although the virus has
we’re all going through the about volunteering for ruptured blood vessel. As is radio, and who was doing come close. Brock’s mo-
same thing right now and Tampa General Hospital’s the case at many U.S. hos- the dishes at home. ther has recovered from it.
it’s a symbol of hope and new “airway team,” Cayer pitals, only emergency sur- The new COVID-19 proce- Co-workers fear catching
love.” says. geries continue at the Tam- dures — it was Brock’s first it. Patients feel alone be-
Brock, 38, adds: “What’s Placing a tube into a pa- pa hospital, to make room day on the new team — cause visitors have been
important is that we stick tient’s mouth and down as the pandemic continues were making them both strictly limited.
together, we work toge- into their airway requires to crest. tense. “We were arguing,” “We have grown men
ther, and we always sup- close contact — and be- They met in nurse anesthe- she says. Later, they found bawling because none of
port each other. And not cause the virus spreads in sia school in 2007. In clas- each other between sur- their family can be there
just Ben and I, but the hu- droplets, the highest level ses, they sat in alphabetical geries. The tension melted. with them,” Brock says.
man race right now.” of protective gear. To con- order. Brock next to Cayer, “All those trivial things that It helps to be married to
The Florida pair share a serve gear and expose fe- she says, “and it just took we were arguing about another nurse, because
home, a profession and, wer health care workers, off from there.” that morning, in the grand “unless you’re here doing
now, a mission — shoulde- the hospital pared down They married five years scheme of things, aren’t this, there’s no way to des-
ring the high-risk duty of pla- staff to a minimum for intu- ago. But on the morning of that important.” The photo cribe it,” she says. “He gets
cing breathing tubes in sur- bations before surgery. the photo, they bickered captures that moment. it.”q

Tech companies step up fight against bad coronavirus info

By AMANDA SEITZ and "The damage to society
BARBARA ORTUTAY is clear cut: it's death,"
The Associated Press Ghosh said. "They don't
CHICAGO (AP) — Poten- want to be held responsi-
tially dangerous corona- ble in any way for perpet-
virus misinformation has uating rumors that could
spread from continent to lead directly to death."
continent like the pan- YouTube began removing
demic itself, forcing the videos that claimed coro-
world's largest tech com- navirus was caused by
panies to take unprece- 5G wireless networks last
dented action to protect week. Some of the videos
public health. had racked up hundreds
Facebook, Google and of thousands of views.
others have begun using Google searches for "5G"
algorithms, new rules and and "coronavirus" now re-
factual warnings to knock direct users news videos
down harmful coronavi- debunking the theory.
rus conspiracy theories, Facebook-owned private
questionable ads and un- messaging service What-
proven remedies that reg- sApp has limited how
ularly crop up on their ser- many chats users can for-
vices — and which could This Tuesday, July 19, 2016, file photo shows the Google logo at the company's headquarters ward messages to in an
jeopardize lives. Health in Mountain View, Calif. effort to limit the spread of
officials, critics and others Associated Press. COVID-19 misinformation.
who have long implored misleading coronavirus in- Health officials have Facebook removed a post Since WhatsApp encrypts
the tech companies to formation and, at times, warned the drug hasn't from Brazilian President Jair all messages, it can't read
step up their response to lobby for it to be removed been proven safe or ef- Bolsanaro, who promoted them to determine if they
viral falsehoods have wel- from Facebook, Google fective as a virus therapy. hydroxychloroquine as contain misinformation.
comed the new effort, and Google's YouTube Days later, Twitter and "working in every place" to The pandemic has thrown
saying the platforms are service. Facebook began crack- treat coronavirus. Twitter up new challenges to
now working faster than Last month, Iranian me- ing down in unprecedent- also removed an associ- content moderation. Early
ever to scrub their sites of dia reported more than ed ways on posts promot- ated video. on, health considerations
coronavirus misinforma- 300 people had died and ing unverified treatments. Facebook has long re- forced the contractors
tion. 1,000 were sickened in the Twitter deleted a post sisted calls to fact check that employ human mod-
"It was definitely, within the country after ingesting by Trump's personal at- or remove false claims di- erators to send most of
companies, a shift," said methanol, a toxic alcohol torney Rudy Giuliani that rectly made by politicians, them home, where for pri-
Andy Pattison, manager rumored to be a remedy described hydroxychlo- arguing the public should vacy reasons they couldn't
of digital solutions for the on social media. An Ari- roqine, a cousin to chlo- be able to see what their do their jobs. Facebook
World Health Organiza- zona man also died after roquine, as "100 percent elected officials say. In this eventually shifted some of
tion, who for nearly two taking chloroquine phos- effective" against corona- pandemic, however, the that work to in-house em-
years has urged compa- phate — a product that virus. The company also platforms have no choice ployees and leaned more
nies like Facebook to take some mistake for the anti- removed a tweet from Fox but to rethink their rules heavily on artificial-intel-
more aggressive action malaria drug chloroquine, News personality Laura In- around misinformation, ligence programs. More
against anti-vaccination which President Donald graham touting what she said Dipayan Ghosh, co- recently, it has made new
misinformation. Trump and conservative called the drug's "promis- director of the Platform arrangements for contract
Pattison said he and his pundits have touted as a ing results." Accountability Project at moderators to do their
team now directly flag treatment for COVID-19. In what may be a first, Harvard Kennedy School. jobs remotely. q