Musk has “huge responsibility” to fight health misinfo on Twitter, WHO says

Enlarge / Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk presents a vaccine production device during a meeting September 2, 2020, in Berlin, Germany. Musk met with vaccine-maker CureVac, with which Tesla has a cooperation to build devices for producing RNA vaccines. (credit: Getty | Filip Singer)

Elon Musk has a "huge responsibility" to combat dangerous, potentially life-threatening health misinformation on Twitter, the World Health Organization said Tuesday.

The United Nations' health agency commented on Monday's news that the tech billionaire has struck a deal to purchase Twitter for $44 billion. WHO officials stressed how damaging misinformation and disinformation could be when it's widely spread in digital spaces like Twitter.

"In cases like this pandemic, good information is life-saving," Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO's Health Emergencies Programme, said. "In some cases, [it's] more life-saving than having a vaccine in the sense that bad information sends you to some very, very bad places."

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