Elon Musk’s coronavirus tweets somehow don’t violate Twitter’s rules

Elon Musk has some thoughts about the coronavirus — thoughts that, naturally, the Tesla CEO decided to share with his 32.4 million Twitter followers. 

Musk’s tweets, which included the false gem that children are “essentially immune,” appear to be in violation of Twitter’s new rules ostensibly aimed at stopping the spread of potentially dangerous COVID-19 misinformation. However, despite what common sense might suggest, it seems the disjointed and ill-informed musings of the entitled billionaire are in fact totally OK with the social media giant. 

A Twitter spokesperson confirmed as much Thursday afternoon in an email to Mashable: “We reviewed the Tweets and they don’t violate our rules,” wrote the spokesperson. 

Notably, Musk’s statement about the immunity of kids appears to contradict the Twitter rule prohibiting “Claims that specific groups, nationalities are never susceptible to COVID-19[.]”

It also reads a lot like an example, provided by Twitter, of prohibited content: “COVID-19 does not infect children because we haven’t seen any cases of children being sick.”

There have, of course, been observed cases of children becoming infected and even dying from COVID-19. 

Musk also suggested possible off-label treatments for COVID-19, positing that chloroquine or Hydroxychloroquine might do the trick. And, despite what serial bullshitter Donald Trump claimed in a Thursday press conference, Bloomberg reports that “An FDA spokesperson said the drug hadn’t been approved for use in Covid-19 patients.”

Musk’s tweets suggesting an unapproved treatment might possibly also violate a different coronavirus-specific rule on Twitter: “Description of treatments or protective measures which are not immediately harmful but are known to be ineffective, are not applicable to the COVID-19 context.”

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Not so, however, according to Twitter. 

Musk appears to have gotten the message and has continued to tweet his way through the coronavirus pandemic at breakneck speed, insisting, among other things, that “panic will cause more harm than the virus,” and casually promising to manufacture much-needed ventilators (will they be submarine shaped?). Oh yeah, and just this afternoon he wrote that there will be “probably close to zero new cases in US too by end of April.”

Because, as the epitome of Silicon Valley hubris, Musk knows deep down inside that if he’s knowledgable about one field, it makes him an expert in all unrelated ones, too. 

Anyway, regardless, Twitter appears cool with it all.