The Trudeau Liberals have found a new way to fund journalism you will never read with 1.5 million dollars earmarked to fight coronavirus misinformation in the Middle East and Africa.   

After successfully buying off most of the Canadian media landscape with a 600 million dollar bailout plan, coronavirus inspired journalist wage top ups, and the ever-increasing 1.5 billion dollar annual subsidy to the CBC, the feds have turned their focus and funding to the world’s journalists.  

And the new taxpayer handout from Global Affairs Canada comes with a special focus on feminism, of course.  

According to a press release issued by Journalists for Human Rights:  

Journalists for Human Rights and the Honourable Karina Gould, Minister for International Development, announced a new project to fight COVID-19 through human rights-based journalism in 12 countries across Africa and the Middle East. Funded by Global Affairs Canada, the 15-month, $1.5 million program will train and support local journalists to provide credible information and debunk misinformation on Covid19 and the impact of COVID-19 on women and girls' rights. The project will directly engage the local journalists and indirectly reach their estimated audiences of 22 million people with accurate and gender-equitable media coverage on COVID-19 in Mali, Tunisia, Gambia, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ghana, Uganda, Tanzania, South Africa, Iraq, Yemen and Mauritania. 

Journalists for Human Rights Executive Director, Rachel Pulfer said the program is meant to fight what the World Health Organization has termed an “infodemic” of misinformation and disinformation about COVID-19.

The World Health Organization itself has faced harsh criticism for its handling of the pandemic and has been widely accused of spreading Chinese disinformation about the nature of the spread of the disease early on, hobbling the Western world’s ability to react.  

The same press release promised the Canadian funded project “will also work towards broad public awareness of the gendered impact of COVID-19 on women and girls.”

However, the girls are doing better than the boys. A recent study published in Frontiers for Public Health found that although men and women are equally as likely to contract COVID-19, men are more likely to suffer severe effects from the illness, including death, independent of age and location.