Conspiracy nation? One in three think governments produce viruses to control people

A Eurobarometer survey assessing beliefs in conspiracy theories finds in Malta a relative majority who think viruses are being produced in government laboratories, purposely to control the freedom of their citizens.

While more then one-third (36%) believe in this far-out conspiracy theory, only 35% believe that it is false while 29% said they don’t know.

The survey shows a wide gap in the European Union between Nordic countries like Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden – where conspiracy theories are widely disbelieved – and eastern European and Mediterranean countries like Romania and Cyprus, where an absolute majority believe governments are actually producing viruses.

The survey shows the Maltese as being the tenth most likely among all 27-member states to believe in the ‘government-made viruses’ conspiracy.

The survey also shows that the Maltese were equally divided when asked whether they believe that “the cure for cancer exists but is hidden from the public by commercial interests.”

A staggering 38% believe this conspiracy theory is true, while an equal amount correctly say that this is false. The survey shows the Maltese are the tenth most likely among all 27 states to believe this conspiracy theory.

In contrast only 4% of Swedes believe these bogus claims.

Apart from assessing belief in medically-related conspiracy theories, the survey also assessed climate change skepticism. On this aspect the Maltese are more in line with mainstream scientific opinion. While 26% of all EU respondents subscribe to the false claim that climate is mostly caused by natural cycles, only 19% of Maltese respondents said likewise.

On the other hand, 68% of Maltese disagree with this claim. The Hungarians are the most likely to believe that climate change is caused by natural cycles (48%) while the Portuguese (13%) are the least likely to believe this.

But alarmingly, the survey shows that 38% of the Maltese believe that antibiotics kill viruses and bacteria – a scientific error which can potentially lead to medicine misuse. Although the incorrect belief that antibiotics can kill viruses remains widespread in Malta, the proportion who think this is false has increased by 28 points over 2005.

The most likely in Europe to wrongly believe that antibiotics kill viruses and not just bacteria are the Cypriots (71%) and Greeks (68%). The least likely to subscribe to this scientific error are the Belgians (7%) and Swedes (6%).

Curiously, slightly less than half of Maltese respondents (44%) could not state whether the statement “Lasers work by focusing on sound waves” is true or false, while 19% incorrectly believe that this is true. Other questions dealt with beliefs on evolution, demography and biology.

An overview of the number of correct and incorrect answers respondents gave across all 11 ‘quiz’ questions included in the survey, shows that only 14% of Maltese respondents gave more than eight correct answers. This puts Malta in nineteenth place among EU countries when it comes to scientific literacy.

Luxembourg, Belgium and Sweden top the charts with more than 44% of their citizens giving more than 8 correct answers. In contrast less than 5% gave 8 correct answers in Cyprus, Bulgaria and Romania.