The head of the World Health Organization thinks Neil Young has a heart of gold when it comes to calling out COVID misinformation.
The legendary musician said “hey hey, my my” music should be removed from Spotify because the streaming giant hosts podcasts by Joe Rogan, who has come under fire for spreading medical misinformation.
While Spotify sided with Rogan and took down Young’s back catalog, the Canadian musician isn’t helpless and did get support from Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO’s director-general, who thanked Young in a tweet “for standing up against misinformation and inaccuracies around #COVID19 vaccination.”
The WHO chief added that “we all have a role to play to end this pandemic and infodemic.”
Earlier this week, Young posted a letter on his website (since removed), saying: “I am doing this because Spotify is spreading fake information about vaccines — potentially causing death to those who believe the disinformation being spread by them.
“With an estimated 11 million listeners per episode, JRE [the Joe Rogan Experience podcast], which is hosted exclusively on Spotify, is the world’s largest podcast and has tremendous influence. Spotify has a responsibility to mitigate the spread of misinformation on its platform, though the company presently has no misinformation policy,” Young wrote. He added: “They can have Rogan or Young. Not both.”
Last week, some 270 doctors, scientists, healthcare professionals and professors wrote an open letter to Spotify, expressing concern about medical misinformation on Rogan’s show.
They wrote: “Spotify is enabling its hosted media to damage public trust in scientific research and sow doubt in the credibility of data-driven guidance offered by medical professionals.”