Fox News and Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo was criticized for spreading “misinformation” by Salon in early March for predicting that there would be “hundreds of thousands” of coronavirus cases in the U.S.
“I think you have to expect constant volatility,” Bartiromo told Fox News anchor Bill Hemmer on March 5. “You know, it’s going to be down 1,000, up 1,000. A lot of back and forth. A lot of volatility. Why? Because there’s so much nervousness on Wall Street and really throughout the country. We don’t know enough. We have not gotten enough information. The administration tried to get ahead of this last week. You know that. They said wait, we will see more cases.”
“My sources are telling me — and I don’t want to panic anybody — but my sources are telling me that we’re going to see tens of thousands, ultimately hundreds of thousands of cases in the United States,” the Fox Business host continued. “This is going to happen. That’s why the administration tried to get ahead of that.”
WATCH:
Matthew Rozsa, reporter for the publication Salon, wrote an article titled, “Bartiromo predicts ‘hundreds of thousands’ of US coronavirus cases: ‘I don’t want to panic anybody.'” The subheader reads: “Fox personalities have spread much misinformation about the coronavirus since the pandemic arrived stateside.”
“Maria Bartiromo predicted Thursday during an appearance on Fox News that ‘hundreds of thousands’ of people will be infected with the coronavirus in the U.S. as disinformation continued to spread on the right-leaning network about the outbreak,” Rozsa wrote. (RELATED: CNN Reporter Blasts Fox News, Says Fox Corp. CEO Responsible For Peddling ‘Poison’ To Society)
Maria Bartiromo predicted Thursday during an appearance on Fox News that “hundreds of thousands” of people will be infected with the coronavirus in the U.S. as disinformation continued to spread on the right-leaning network about the outbreak. @Salonhttps://t.co/i7KGOR4Jg2
— Matthew Rozsa (@MatthewRozsa) March 7, 2020
Raw Story also published Rozka’s Salon piece.
As of early Thursday morning, there were over 200,000 U.S. coronavirus cases and more than 4,600 deaths.
Fox News dominated recent cable news coronavirus coverage, posting record Nielsen ratings numbers in late March.