Essential Research: coronavirus restrictions and conspiracy theories

A poll suggests a significant proportion of the population believes coronavirus was engineered in a Chinese laboratory, but other conspiracy theories remain consigned to the fringe.

Courtesy of The Guardian, some headline results of another weekly Essential Research poll on coronavirus, the full report of which should be published later today. This includes regular questions on federal and state governments’ handling with the crisis, of which we are only told that respondents remain highly positive, and on easing restrictions, for which we are told only 25% now consider it too soon, which is down two on last time and has been consistently declining over five surveys.

Beyond that, the survey gauged response to a number of what might be described as conspiracy theories concerning the virus. By far the most popular was the notion that the virus “was engineered and released from a Chinese laboratory in Wuhan”, which has received a certain amount of encouragement from the Daily Telegraph but is starkly at odds with the scientific consensus. Agreement and disagreement with this proposition was tied on 39%.

Thirteen per cent subscribed to a theory that Bill Gates was involved in the creation and spread of the virus, with 71% disagreeing; 13% agreed the virus was not dangerous and was being used to force people to get vaccines, with 79% disagreeing; 12% thought the 5G network was being used to spread the virus, with 75% disagreeing; and 20% agreed the number of deaths was being exaggerated, with “more than 70%” disagreeing. The poll also found 77% agreed that the outbreak in China was worse than the official statistics showed.

The poll was conducted Thursday to Sunday from a sample of 1073.

UPDATE: Full report here.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

3,318 comments on “Essential Research: coronavirus restrictions and conspiracy theories”

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  2. “ I’ve heard that Albo believes that you can live forever if you drink blood.”

    Riddle me this, OC: is Albo a Beagle Boy, you just a pawn?

  3. This will not please the test everyone now peeps but

    Our local Maccas was one of the ones closed due to a delivery driver testing positive.
    Lots of local staff advised to get tested plus their families.
    The small local testing centre was overwhelmed and people having to travel fair distances to the next testing stations.
    They are concentrating on teachers and those with symptoms – not those with a very small chance of having had contact. One young guy – I think not a Maccas staff, but trying to do the right thing, was turned away after a long wait and rather upset.

    This information came from a local facebook but the head of the local testing centre joined the discussion to say they had tested about 3x the people yesterday that they had on Friday.

  6. Barney in Tanjung Bunga
    Tuesday, May 19th, 2020 – 9:04 am
    Comment #90

    Thanks. My post was vaguely ambiguous. Whether I am mostly dead (probably) or older folk are in that undesirable state. A sense of humour essential .

    Over from me time for a lawn check with a view to mowing.

  7. Buce: ‘The modelling of the pandemic has been wildly inaccurate. ‘.

    I suspect Cud may challenge you on that statement. His predictions of what was going to happen matched accurately with what eventually happened.

  9. Ray (UK) @ #100 Tuesday, May 19th, 2020 – 9:16 am

    PeeBee

    I’ve been driving on permanent nights since late 1999 .. it’s great, the only time you can get from Leeds to Manchester “ovver t’tops” – ie over the Pennines – on the M62 without sitting in a traffic jam 🙂

    Mind you I hear the lack of daytime traffic during the lockdown has been a real boon to the regular day drivers, almost like being on nights

    One of my most vivid memories is struggling over the M62 in a VW campervan in the wrong lane. I checked the rear vision mirror to find it conpketely filled by the word FORD. 1974 I think.

  11. Zwaktyld is correct to state that there are a lot of young un-Enlightened people out there also.

    Just one example hit me in the face last night when I was watching the Channel 9 News with my son in order to get the low down on the latest Coalition money-shovelling exercise to their mates like Phillip Ruddock on Hornsby Council.

    So the story before that was about a young man who murdered his parents in their home on the regional outskirts of Brisbane last weekend with a sledge hammer!! The 9News reporter dutifully sought out one of his friends to interview about the guy. My son and I spent a good 3 minutes listening to this guy describing his friend as kind and gentle and wouldn’t hurt a fly!! He just couldn’t believe that he could have done it. He wouldn’t even let a shred of doubt enter his mind. And, what’s more, he was going to stand by his mate as he attempts to prove his innocence!!

    No mention of the fact that the guy was caught by the police on the M1, 800km away from Brisbane at Berowra, driving his parents car!! Nope, the friend just wouldn’t believe he had done it because the person he knew, was so kind and gentle!!

    Thus I find it very easy to believe that there are just as many young people out there that will fervently subscribe to conspiracy theories. Probably because a mate shared it on facebook with them. And you trust your mates over anyone else. 😐

  13. The current generation of 65-year olds didn’t grow up with computers or the internet but, unlike 65 year olds twenty years ago, are likely to have used both at work. Not all, but probably most.

  14. C@t

    It’s always difficult to reconcile someone doing something unimaginable and heinous.
    It will take a while for this friend to come to terms with the reality of his friend having done such a thing. I should add. Allegedly……

  15. poroti

    Thanks, it’s certainly a weight off my mind now I’ll have a regular income again

    ajm

    Can you remember the ‘little house on the prairie’ (the farmhouse between the carriageways) on the climb up Windy Hill to the M62 summit ?

    It’s still there 🙂

  17. Victoria @ #113 Tuesday, May 19th, 2020 – 9:32 am

    C@t

    It’s always difficult to reconcile someone doing something unimaginable and heinous.
    It will take a while for this friend to come to terms with the reality of his friend having done such a thing. I should add. Allegedly……

    Oh yes, I forgot to add, allegedly. 🙂

    Though I told the story merely to exemplify how easy it was for the young to also believe what they want, absent compelling evidence to the contrary. It’s not just older people. In fact, the dumbing down of society has proceeded apace and is contributing to it.

  18. Just when you think the shit show cant get any worse.

    Charlie Sykes
    @SykesCharlie
    ·
    2h
    I think America should take a mental health day tomorrow.
    Quote Tweet

    David Freedlander
    @freedlander
    · 3h
    In the last ten minutes Donald Trump has said that all inspector generals should be fired because “they may be Obama people,” revealed that he is taking hydroxychloroquine and that the doctors who warn against it should be ignored because they are probably Democrats

  19. The narrowest line of fog running across from the eastern side of the Harbour Bridge enveloping the two warships parked outside Malcolm Turnbull’s house along with Garden Island.

    The Domain fields enjoying the first time since who knows when not being despoiled by lunchtime footballers or some imminent concert.

  20. C@t

    It’s good to have healthy skepticism.
    But I’m just not getting what is going on right now.

    We are experiencing a global pandemic and people rather than understand that the odds of something like this eventually occurring was somewhat inevitable, they are likely to believe it is a deep state plot that involves Bill Gates creating this for some reason or another.

    It boggles the bloody mind.

  22. Certain correspondents to this blog, apparently with close connections to the inner party, have said that Albo is unelectable due to his links with Ian Macdonald.
    I do not believe this. However, he may be a burner keeping the seat warm for ????

  25. Vic,

    When you are fed a steady diet of televisual drama where complex cases, issues and relationships are sorted within an hour including Commercials, then it is not that surprising that people expect reality to be the same.

  27. DWH

    You have obviously not compared FOX News. The Young Turks. Robert Reich Pod Save America Rolling Stone Useful Idiots and Rising with Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti from the Hill.

    Then you can use YouTube to go down the rabbit hole described by the New York Times of conspiracy theory.

    It’s not the medium it’s the message.
    As I said ages ago. We are living in an age that mirrors the handing out of leaflets before the printing press.

    That’s why you see quack medicine being back in vogue.
    The only surprise is one of the main spreaders of that propaganda is now President of the United States.

  28. Victoria @ #119 Tuesday, May 19th, 2020 – 9:44 am

    C@t

    It’s good to have healthy skepticism.
    But I’m just not getting what is going on right now.

    We are experiencing a global pandemic and people rather than understand that the odds of something like this eventually occurring was very high, they are likely to believe it is a deep state plot that involves Bill Gates creating this for some reason or another.

    It boggles the bloody mind.

    I think you need to simply take comfort in the fact that it seems to not get above the figure of about 1.5/10 of us. At least I’m taking comfort in that fact! So the rest of us are holding the line.

  29. Buce: “It’s funny – conspiracy theories are scoffed at here – yet this site lives off conspiracy theories about neoliberals and “ those that are getting screwed by their own party, will continue to vote for them. So there is some serious cognitive dissonance” and the PM and Hillsong, the marital fidelity of past LNP PMs and their COS and on and on they go. Have a good look at yourselves in the mirror. Truly FMD.”

    Yep, in my life I’ve encountered plenty of left-wing people who believe in conspiracy theories: typically involving the CIA and, in Australia, ASIO.

    In the global context, you can start with the various theories around JFK’s assassination (most recently promoted by Bob Dylan). Then travel through Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 with an unbelievably complex theory about 9/11 and the second Gulf War (I personally lost track of it) involving Saudi Arabia, Dick Cheney, Haliburton, etc. And then there’s the “Hillary wuz robbed by Russian interference.’

    Moving to Australia, we have the Bogle-Chandler murders, the disappearance of Frank Nugan, the CIA involvement in the dismissal of the Whitlam Government (to be fair, Christopher Boyce revealed that there was a glimmer of truth in that theory), and a whole range of outlandish theories involving members of the Murdoch family.

    Really, who doesn’t enjoy a good conspiracy theory? My personal view is that almost none of them have any chance of being true, because they mostly depend on the idea that hundreds if not many thousands of people will have been able to keep their mouths shut for many years.

    I still find JFK’s assassination intriguing, largely because of Oswald’s subsequent murder. But I certainly believe Oswald was the lone assassin (although I reckon there’s something in the theory that JFK might have been hit both by Oswald and by a shot from a police weapon).

  30. Oakeshott Country @ #121 Tuesday, May 19th, 2020 – 9:47 am

    Certain correspondents to this blog, apparently with close connections to the inner party, have said that Albo is unelectable due to his links with Ian Macdonald.
    I do not believe this. However, he may be a burner keeping the seat warm for ????

    Oakeshott Country,
    As I have pointed out numerous times before (and I do wish you had the guts to just call me out by name), it has nothing to do with any ties I (or others if you want to try and say you were alluding to others), have to any ‘inner circles’ of the NSW ALP. My statements here were based on articles in The Sydney Morning Herald, which I provided as evidence. Go back into the PB archives if you don’t believe me.

  31. Pandemic….fear….fight/flight….subscription to fantasies/conspiracies/denialism are forms of flight. Most of our behaviours are reflexive/autonomic. The reflexive avoidance of the pandemic is simply another example of denialism. Of course, this reflex, like the fight reflex, is susceptible to political manipulation. Of this, we can see a perfect example here at PB this morning, where Bucephalus has attempted to debunk the epidemiology of viral spread.

    Sowing doubt as a political tactic is a well-proven technique in propaganda. Bucephalus qualifies as a propagandist, haven’t yesterday used ‘doubt’ in an anti-Semitic sledge of Labor’s Jewish MPs.

  32. Baba

    There is no conspiracy theory around Murdoch. We have the evidence of Leveson. We know Leaders pay court to win favourable propaganda coverage.

    Trump has exposed Murdoch. Fox News is an abomination.

    Edit: By comparison it gives Russia’s RT credibility

  34. “shellbell says:
    Tuesday, May 19, 2020 at 9:42 am
    The narrowest line of fog running across from the eastern side of the Harbour Bridge enveloping the two warships parked outside Malcolm Turnbull’s house along with Garden Island.”

    I hadn’t heard. Is Malcolm engineering an armed uprising with sections of the navy? Guns trained on Kirribilli House?

  36. guytaur: “We know Leaders pay court to win favourable propaganda coverage.”

    Of course they do. That’s not a conspiracy theory: it isn’t sufficiently clandestine or complicated.

  37. Well, let’s look at the Bogle-Chandler ‘murders’. People naturally look for an explanation for everything and if they can’t find real evidence they let their imagination go wild. The direction it then takes depends on their core beliefs and attitudes. With Bogan-Chandler, a scientific explanation was eventually found (marsh gas?) but it took a long time.

    Equally, the motivations and actions behind public figures can sometimes take years to be revealed – not necessarily when they write their autobiographies!!

  38. As far as interstate borders go, McGowan has made it plain, and has done so for weeks, that the interstate ones will be the last to open. This suggests opening will be some weeks away yet.
    There has been plenty of local whinging about the intrastate borders especially the good burghers of Geraldton who felt they were left out when it was decided to keep the MidWest region closed off. The boofheads had to be reminded by the Police Commissioner that the MidWest covered a vast area with many isolated communities (at risk) not just the citizens around the Geraldton-Dongara area…….Same applies to the Kimberley. My heart bled for all those Grey Nomads whose plans were upset in not being able to take in the winter sun for awhile.

  41. Of course, Bucephalus is not the only propagandist that publishes here. The editors of Rexology make constant use of doubt and innuendo to sledge Labor. The nathylated comments about Shorten are also propaganda. They are as tireless in their efforts as any News Ltd hack.

  42. A rapidly intensifying Category 5 super cyclone is moving across the Bay of Bengal and heading for the India-Bangladesh border. The storm could cause extensive damage in an area already suffering from the covid-19 pandemic.

    With sustained wind speeds of 250 kilometres per hour, Cyclone Amphan is the strongest storm in the northern hemisphere so far this year. It’s expected to bring heavy rainfall to the eastern part of Bengal by Monday night and travel to the Indian state of West Bengal the next day. On Wednesday, it is expected to make landfall near Kolkata.

  43. CI

    You are a great anti Green propagandist.

    For you even mentioning their name is a toxic vote turn off.

    Pot Kettle Black.

  45. Tony Windsor
    @TonyHWindsor
    ·
    3h
    Due respect Premier @GladysB you don’t have the right or moral high ground to preach covid strategies to Qld and Victoria. You have presided over the two big policy disasters in the nation, Ruby P and Newmarch..@WarrenEntsch is correct “look at how Qld achieved low infection rate

  46. meher babasays: Tuesday, May 19, 2020 at 9:58 am

    I still find JFK’s assassination intriguing, largely because of Oswald’s subsequent murder. But I certainly believe Oswald was the lone assassin (although I reckon there’s something in the theory that JFK might have been hit both by Oswald and by a shot from a police weapon).

    *************************************************************

    I was always impressed by the revelations of famed US military snipers that they could not duplicate the assassination shootings and they said if they could not do it, they found it hard to believe that Oswald – not necessarily a great shot – with an antiquated WW 2 rifle could ;

    From the article :

    “The reason I knew that Oswald could not have done it, was because I could not have done it,” said former US Marine sniper, Craig Roberts. Credited with numerous kills while serving in Vietnam , Roberts turned an objective eye on the shot heard ‘round the world. After he visited Dealey Plaza, after viewing the so-called “sniper’s lair,” on the sixth floor of the book depository, and after staring at the large oak tree overspreading much of Elm Street, Roberts said, “I walked away from the window in disgust. I had seen all I needed to know that Oswald could not have been the lone shooter.”

    Not content with his own critical appraisal, Roberts turned to another, equally knowledgeable shooter. “According to my friend, Gunnery Sergeant Carlos Hathcock, the former senior instructor for the US Marine Corps Sniper Instructor School at Quantico, Virginia, it could not be done as described by the FBI investigators.”

    “Let me tell you what we did at Quantico,” Hathcock recalls. “We reconstructed the whole thing: the angle, the range, the moving target, the time limit, the obstacles, everything. I don’t know how many times we tried it, but we couldn’t duplicate what the Warren Commission said Oswald did. Now if I can’t do it, how in the world could a guy who was a non-qual on the rifle range and later only qualified ‘marksman’ do it?”

    Of course, sergeant Carlos Hathcock was only the most famous American military sniper in history, credited with a confirmed 93 kills. But apologists for a lone assassin, who continue to enjoy mainstream media sponsorship 40 years later, continue to argue that an average shooter like Oswald, using a decrepit, war surplus weapon, could have killed Kennedy. Case closed.”

    https://oswald-not-guilty.blogspot.com/2009/10/oswald-not-guilty-famed-sniper-says.html

  47. OC: “Certain correspondents to this blog, apparently with close connections to the inner party, have said that Albo is unelectable due to his links with Ian Macdonald.
    I do not believe this. However, he may be a burner keeping the seat warm for ????”

    Come election time, the history of Albo’s links to Macdonald will definitely be raised in some quarters, and he will need to be in a position to address them.

    However, I think Albo’s biggest problem is going to be that of persuading the electorate that Labor still doesn’t harbour plans to increase their tax burden, take away imputation credits, etc.

    In terms of seat-warming: there’s really nobody there. If Albo suddenly decided to call it quits, there’s no obvious successor.
    Marles is not credible.
    Plibersek isn’t up to it.
    Wong doesn’t seem the least bit interested in coming down from the Senate.
    Chalmers isn’t up to it: all he’s really got going for him is the Queensland address on his birth certificate.

    Burke is some sort of chance but I’m told he’s not well liked within Caucus and I think he comes across to voters as a little pompous. But he’s probably the best public speaker we’ve seen in politics since the days of Gough Whitlam and Kim Beazley Snr.

    As I’ve posted before, I reckon the two best long-term prospects in the Caucus are currently both sitting outside Shadow Cabinet: namely Ed Husic and Clare O’Neil. How stupid is that?

  48. guytaur says:
    Tuesday, May 19, 2020 at 10:14 am
    CI

    You are a great anti Green propagandist.

    That’s very kind of you. Thanks. I think they should be challenged at every step along the political path. They make life much more difficult than it needs to be.

  50. CI

    No your propaganda makes life more difficult.

    You keep repeating right wing talking points that undermine science and Labor with your Green attacks.

    It’s a false equivalence thing.

    At least though you admit it’s propaganda

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