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The British morning television presenter Eamonn Holmes recently said on air that the media in the United Kingdom did not know for sure that 5G does not cause covid-19. Telecom masts in Great Britain have been the target of several attacks by people as a conspiracy theory claiming that the 5G signal causes covid-19 has spread across the country. Multiple British media reported on the story and denied the theories.‘’What I don’t accept is mainstream media immediately slapping that down as not true when they don’t know it’s not true,’’ Eamonn Holmes said on Monday, April 13 on the morning programme ‘’This Morning’’ which he presents on ITV. Because of the theories, the British telecommunications company BT experienced 22 of its masts attacked over the Easter holiday whilst Vodafone had had 20 masts attacked according to Reuters. CLAIM: Was Eamonn Holmes correct in saying that the British mainstream media did not know that the conspiracy theories regarding 5G and covid-19 were false, when they reported them as being false? Are the theories untrue?A premise for fact-checking Eamonn Holmes’ claim is that the conspiracy theories are untrue. According to the theories, the symptoms of covid-19 are caused by electromagnetic radiation and not by a virus. An obvious problem with this theory is that 5G antennas are not present in, for example, Iran, which by April 22 had almost 85,000 confirmed cases of covid-19 according to Johns Hopkins University.Other theories claim that 5G might suppress the immune system and that viruses can communicate through radio waves. An independent UK fact-checking charity called Full Fact has debunked these theories saying that ‘’there is no evidence that 5G WiFi networks are linked to the new coronavirus’’ also referring to the fact that covid-19 is present in countries that don’t have 5G antennas. The new 5G masts do use a higher frequency than the older generations of masts, but the maximum levels of electromagnetic radiation from them are still approximately 66 times lower than the international safety limits meaning that the signals are not dangerous or harmful. Instead, coronavirus is believed to have been transferred from bats to humans potentially via an intermediate species. Sky News has reported that spike proteins and molecules on the outside of the virus are strong evidence that the virus evolved organically according to scientists. X-ray images and CT scans also show how covid-19 patients’ lungs fill with a sticky mucus leaving no space behind for air. This 3D video from @RSNA shows what are called ground-glass opacities in the lungs of a #COVID-19 patient. These opacities on the CT scan indicate pneumonia as the spaces which are normally filled by air are being filled with something else.Read more: https://t.co/whj7XQVITe pic.twitter.com/SQdoervbNO— Sky News Tech (@SkyNewsTech) March 12, 2020 How did the media report?The day after making his claim, Eamonn Holmes wanted to clarify his comments saying that his intention was to highlight that ‘’many people are rightly concerned and are looking for answers, and that’s simply what I was trying to impart yesterday.The attacks on 5G masts have been widely covered by the British media. And now that we know that the theories are untrue
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