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As misinformation abounds regarding the novel coronavirus, scientists, health officials, and even Facebook are trying to combat the spread of fake news and questionable scientific findings. In the most recent takedown of inaccurate information, Science reports today (February 4) that a widely reported study describing the case of an asymptomatic woman who transmitted coronavirus to a colleague while visiting Germany from China was based on misleading accounts.
According to the news report, the authors who published their findings of asymptomatic transmission in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) last week gathered their evidence from interviews with other patients who had been in contact with her. But when government health officials in Germany spoke to the woman herself, she reported having felt sick at the time the transmission occurred.
“I feel bad about how this went, but I don’t think anybody is at fault here,” coauthor ...
