Australian Government moves to torpedo 5G-coronavirus myth

A new outbreak of 5G-related fires has seen the Morrison Government move to torpedo claims of 5G links to coronavirus.

Anti-5G activists rally in Los Angeles. Picture: AP.

A new outbreak of 5G-related fires has seen the Morrison Government move to torpedo claims of 5G links to coronavirus.

Communications minister Paul Fletcher says any suggestion that there is a link between 5G and coronavirus is utterly baseless. “As the Chief Medical Officer has said, 5G does not cause the coronavirus and it does not spread coronavirus,” he said.

His statement follows more suspicious cell tower fires. Auckland had two cell phone tower-related fires on the weekend and according to reports New Zealand has had 16 suspicious fires and attacks at cell phone installations in six weeks.

Another suspicious cell phone tower fire occurred in Adelaide on May 9. Recently there’s been a protest in Mullumbimby in northern NSW and concern about 5G was among the issues raised by Melbourne protesters wanting the Andrews Government to relax lockdown restrictions.

More than 70 cell phone towers have been attacked in the UK with Canada also experiencing cell tower vandalism. A series of 5G-related protests have taken place across the world this month.

All of this has authorities worried.

Mr Fletcher says the radio waves used by all generations of mobile and wireless technologies, including 5G, have been studied rigorously for decades, and there is no evidence that the use of these radio waves in mobile networks is harmful to health or related to the current health pandemic.

Concerns about 5G and its safety have been around for a long time with news myth-busting service NewsGuard citing Russian news sources including rt.com as a super spreader of the myth originally.

NewsGuard has linked the origins of the 5G-coronavirus myth to another source – a January 20 story on anonymously-run French conspiracy theory blog Les Moutons Enragés, according to data First Draft News shared with NewsGuard.

“The claims then spread across Facebook Groups and YouTube channels already steeped in misleading 5G claims (such as asserting that it can cause cancer) with a new angle highlighting the novel coronavirus,” NewsGuard says on its site.

“They were then amplified on social media by celebrities such as actor Woody Harrelson and boxer Amir Khan.

“Some in the UK eventually attacked 5G telephone poles, prompting the Department for Digital, Culture, Media, and Sport to call on platforms to take action against the spread of these conspiracies,” says NewsGuard on its site.

The government wants Australians to rely on “reputable and authoritative sources of information” such as Australia’s Chief Medical Officer and the independent Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA).

“Interfering or tampering with telecommunications facilities is a criminal offence. The Australian Government will not tolerate any vandalism of communications infrastructure and I urge Australians to report any suspicious activity to their local police,” Mr Fletcher says.