Fox News found itself under fire Thursday from a growing group of journalism professionals concerned with the television network’s coverage of the global novel coronavirus pandemic.
Todd Gitlin, a Columbia University School of Journalism professor, led an open letter addressed to Fox Corporation Chairman Rupert Murdoch and his son, Fox Corporation CEO Lachlan Murdoch, accusing them of risking the lives of Fox News viewers by allowing the network to broadcast false and misleading reporting about the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
Shared by Mr. Gitlin on social media, the letter slams Fox News personalities for subjecting their audience to dangerous misinformation by minimizing the deadly pandemic and downplaying the prevalence of COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the coronavirus, before urging the Murdochs to intervene.
“The basic purpose of news organizations is to discover and tell the truth. This is especially necessary, and obvious, amid a public health crisis. Television bears a particular responsibility because even more millions than usual look there for reliable information,” reads an excerpt from the letter.
“Inexcusably, Fox News has violated elementary canons of journalism. In so doing, it has contributed to the spread of a grave pandemic. Urgently, therefore, in the name of both good journalism and public health, we call upon you to help protect the lives of all Americans — including your elderly viewers — by ensuring that the information you deliver is based on scientific facts,” the letter concludes.
Dozens of fellow journalism and communications professors and journalists have signed their names to the letter, CNN first reported Wednesday evening.
Mr. Gitlin, who also chairs the Ph.D. program in communications at Columbia, told The Washington Times that the number of signatures stood at 78 and counting as of Thursday afternoon.
Fox News has faced frequent criticism in recent weeks over the network’s coverage of the coronavirus and COVID-19 amid the pandemic claiming lives across the country and abroad.
Kara Swisher, a co-founder of the Recode tech site, wrote in an op-ed published Tuesday by The New York Times that Fox News hosts including especially Sean Hannity have threatened the lives of the network’s viewers by dishing out “dangerous misinformation” about the coronavirus, such as comparing it the flu and claiming that Democrats and members of the media were exploiting the outbreak to “bludgeon” President Trump.
Mr. Hannity responded to the op-ed during his eponymous Fox News show Wednesday evening by threatening to sue Mr. Swisher, who he labeled a “far-left media mob maniac.”
Fox News offered no immediately comment on the letter led by Mr. Gitlin.
Nearly a million people around the world have contracted COVID-19 since the disease was first reported in late December, according to data maintained by Johns Hopkins University. More than 204,000 have recovered and more than 50,000 have died, according to the data.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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