COVID-19 rumours and grapevines and their impact on the people

Abstract

COVID-19 is a novel virus never before seen on the surface of the earth. It took the world and her scientists by surprise. It was initially indefinable, unclassifiable, untreatable, and uncontrollable. The situation resulted in a lot of suspicions and rumours about its nature, spread, cure, control etc. This work intends to study the suspicions and rumours that attended that situation and their impacts on the people of Enugu state, Nigeria. The work was guided by the social responsibility theory. The studied sample comprised of two hundred and fifty five (255) randomly selected respondents from the Local Government Areas whose opinions were elicited through questionnaires and interviews. The result revealed a lot of suspicions and rumours about the virus and its management. It manifested the fact that intensive and prolonged advertisements and public relations were needed in such a situation but the efforts in that regard were abysmally poor.