John McGahon (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I deleted those couple of emails that I got straight away. When it is a copy and paste job, one cannot take it too seriously but I will focus on the rest. Two thirds of the people in intensive care units in this country are not vaccinated so what more do we need to be told about the power of vaccines? It is scientific evidence that vaccines work. This links to some points I will make about Facebook and the prevalence of Covid-19 misinformation on the platform and its groups, about which I have spoken for the past year.

This morning we heard reports that Facebook chief executive Mr. Mark Zuckerberg is planning to overhaul and rename Facebook. That will not remove the toxicity in the concept of what Facebook has become. In August this year Facebook stated it removed dozens of sources of anti-vaccination information but there were anti-vaccination protests nonetheless. They were not huge and comprised a rabble of head-the-balls. A couple of them will be coming along tomorrow, Thursday, and it is all being advertised through Facebook. For example, it is stated that this will not be a child-friendly protest. One post reads: "We are the people demanding this caretaker Government stands down with immediate effect the continuance of medical apartheid and lockdown of this people." These people are being radicalised online.

We saw excellent testimony before the United States Senate by Ms Frances Haugen some weeks ago, who said that in order for Facebook to maximise profits, the company decides the algorithm, leading to outrage and hate bouncing off each other. The algorithm increases the level of toxicity and hatred online and as a result we see events like people going into hospitals to tell people vaccines are killing people and they will save the people, only to see them dying a few days later. There must be something serious done about Covid-19 misinformation spread online, particularly on Facebook. Governments must now step in to regulate the area as social media has failed to do it time and again.