NEW POLL: CNN and MSNBC Viewers Got Covid Much Less Than People Who Watch Fox News — By a Whopping 17 Points

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Viewers of CNN and MSNBC were less likely to say they’ve contracted Covid than people who mainly rely on Fox News and conservative media for information, according to a new poll.

Newly-published data from an Axios/Ipsos poll shows that “a significant driver of opinion is people’s news source, with Fox News and conservative outlet readers differing substantially from MSNBC and CNN viewers.”

It’s no secret that views about the coronavirus pandemic and related matters have been influenced by partisanship almost since the very beginning.

And it’s not all that surprising that such divisions would become evident in tracking those views by news diet. But some of the differences that showed up in the Axios/Ipsos survey were chillingly stark.

For example, 84 percent of respondents whose main sources of news are CNN and/or MSNBC said they’d been vaccinated, 27 point higher than respondents who use sources of news other than cable news, and 16 points higher than those with a Fox News/conservative media diet. The CNN/MSNBC group was 26 points more likely to be boosted (at 66%) than the Fox News/conservative group at 40 percent.

Fox News has taken a lot of criticism over the spreading and promotion of misinformation about Covid and the Covid vaccines. Some critics have even blamed Fox News for deaths due to Covid-19. One particular result shows the critics of the network may have been on to something sort of.

The survey tracked respondents “who either tested positive for COVID-19 or report that they had COVID-19 without officially testing positive” by their “main news source.”

Only 28 percent of respondents whose main sources of news are CNN and/or MSNBC reported having contracted Covid, while a whopping 45 percent of those with a Fox News/conservative media diet reported getting it — a 17-point difference. Those with no main news source or one other than cable news also reported contracting Covid at 45 percent.